Why Debian Matters More Than Ever

Julie188 writes "If you look at the feature list for Debian 6, released on February 6, it's easy to be underwhelmed. This is especially true when measuring Debian against its offspring, like Ubuntu. Debian doesn't get much credit, and its become trendy for industry pundits to claim it's become irrelevant. But it's more relevant than ever. If you're using Ubuntu (or Linux Mint, or Mepis...), you're really using Debian with some enhancements. According to a presentation given recently by Debian Project Leader (DPL) Stefano Zacchiroli, only 7% of Ubuntu is directly derived from upstream projects, Canonical's projects, or other non-Debian sources. Of the rest, 74% of Ubuntu is rebuilt Debian packages, and 18% are patched and rebuilt Debian packages."

Comments

Since when?

[Tubal-Cain]

Debian doesn't get much credit, and its become trendy for industry pundits to claim it's become irrelevant.

News to me. Who's calling it irrelevant?

Re:Since when?

[Anonymous Coward]

Obviously nobody important. Ubuntu is more like extended Debian family. They even contribute back to Debian. Heck, I even use the Wine packages from an Ubuntu PPA (Lucid) unmodified. Would it make sense to say that Ubuntu is irrelevant if Kubuntu became a big deal? No. This is just stirring up an anthill.

Re:Since when?

[garyisabusyguy]

If anything it makes me question 'industry pundits' who fail to recognize the layered way that open source projects are able to build on each other.

Like saying a plant is irrelevant to the flowers that grow on it

Re:Since when?

[clang_jangle]

Who's calling it irrelevant?

You know, that guy who always fails to get his wireless working in Debian, then downloads Ubuntu and goes on a rant about how everything should Just Work like Ubuntu did for him that one time on that one machine...

Re:Since when?

[foxed]

Steven Vaughan-Nichols is calling it "no longer as important as it once was". See http://www.zdnet.com/blog/open-source/the-new-debian-linux-irrelevant/8218

Re:Since when?

[Anonymous Coward]

We have this information, provided by the popcon (popularity-contest) package.

Re:Since when?

[garcia]

People who are concerned with more current software, easy installers, and flashing GUIs out of the box.

For those of us that want a very stable and reliable server and don't want to have to deal with a bunch of garbage, Debian is the way to go. However, I say this as I just finally finished up hunting down all the script issues which arose for me (for the first time) following my upgrade to Squeeze.

It's been a fun week to say the least and yet, for whatever reason, I still cannot upload one of my many CSVs to Google Docs for backup via the API. I'll get around to figuring it out eventually I guess.

Re:Since when?

[countertrolling]

Somebody named Steven J. Vaughan-Nichols the third. Should be working at the DMV

Re:Since when?

[icebike]

Its called a straw man.

Set up false claims then demolish them in a fit of peek.

If anything people have voiced concern for Debian since so many distros depend heavily on it
and its purity.

Re:Since when?

[turtledawn]

pique :-)

Re:Since when?

[icebike]

DOH!
I save my best spelling for those who pay me.

I thought it looked wrong when I typed it, but couldn't remember the right spelling. Thanks for the reminder.

Re:Since when?

[Anonymous Coward]

agreed. debian is probably the most successful linux distribution ever, and i'd probably turn to freebsd before another linux distro.

sadly, one often hears a sense on the debian mailing lists, etc, that users (and even debian developers) would like to make debian slicker and more appealing to desktop users (more like ubuntu, or mint, for example). i consider this (especially the infighting) to be a huge mistake. ubuntu is just "the externalization of all the tweaks suitable for desktop users", and I consider this to be "The Right (tm)" solution to the "how best to please everyone all the time" problem (aka the "world domination syndrom") that most distros suffer from.

i really appreciate debian as a solid foundation. fwiw, i usually install a base system and then add on from there.

debian, and all the derivative distros should work together while supporting these types of forks... ubuntu should just be a repository of exactly/only the packages that are tweaked or added above and beyond the debian packages. it should be reasonable to just add an ubuntu repo to my sources file and do an upgrade to get to a typical ubuntu.

Re:Since when?

[Anonymous Coward]

Linus: I always felt that Debian was a pointless exercise.

Re:Since when?

[KiloByte]

Say who? If you're going to call others irrelevant, shouldn't you first have some modicum of relevancy yourself?

Re:Since when?

[eldepeche]

Yeah, but he also says stuff like "pain-in-the-rump." Who cares what he thinks?

Re:Since when?

[deek]

I'd even recommend Debian for people who want the latest software updates. That's what testing and unstable are for. Using package pinning, you can run a stable base, with selected testing and unstable packages. Mix and match what you want. Debian will cope fine with it. That's the beauty of the system.

Of course, you have to be a little more careful, but it's easy enough to revert to a previously installed package if you have issues. I've been running a mixed testing and unstable install on my laptop, and have had only one issue in the last few years where I needed to revert a package.

Re:Since when?

[aztektum]

Who?

Re:Since when?

[tomhudson]

Piqued, peeked, peaked ... they're, their, there ... rein, reign, rain.

Why can't it just be like flammable and inflammable - oh wait ... that's even worse.

Re:Since when?

[JustOK]

many of the ones using a broadcom chip can't get online to talk about their experiences

Re:Since when?

[Anonymous Coward]

i think you mean pique.

Re:Since when?

[Anonymous Coward]

i don't think so, call something irrelevant is an observation, not a declaration

Re:Since when?

[Daniel Phillips]

Steven Vaughan-Nichols is calling it "no longer as important as it once was".

Perhaps he doesn't know that Ubuntu depends on it, so do most live CD distros.

Re:Since when?

[sg_oneill]

Oh absolutely. I recently came to realise just how much I took Debian for granted when I had to set up a Django site with Post-GIS on a CentOS (5.5) box.

Out of the box Centos only supported Python 2.4(!) and if you update it, you break everything. So trying to install a parallell version, I tried to use the EPEL repository to install Python 2.6. All good and fine until I realised I had to recompile my own pysocopg2 driver.

Then I realised Postgres and PostGIS where way too old for django. Could I update? Nope! the 8.4 version in epel didnt have any obvious version of PostGIS.

Giving up at wasting 2 days of my clients time recompiling things, trying to patch broken scripts, fighting busted versions of upgraded non supported software and pulling hair out, I badgered the host to install Debian squeeze for me (thanks Rackforce!) and they did.

Heres how I then did all this without pain on Squeeze:

root@debian:~# apt-get install postgresql-8.4-postgis
root@debian:~# apt-get install libapache2-mod-passenger
root@debian:~# apt-get install python-django python-django-south

And thats that. Server set up in 4 easy commands. No compiling, no complicated patch files, everything automatically and intelligently downloaded, installed, and checked for conflicts by the OS.

You'll note it looks like I have missed some things. Not true, apt-get knows installing an apache mod without apache is silly and did it for me, likewise installing postgis without the server itself is also silly. Everything done, checked for sanity, and so on.

Now of course I know YUM can do all that too, but thats no good to me, when the repository is that old its got 7 year old language distros as its cutting edge.

Its amazing to think that once upon a time Debian was considered behind the times.

See why I love this operating system?

Re:Since when?

[cgenman]

Steven Vaughan-Nichols is calling it "no longer as important as it once was"

He should know. He's on ZDnet.

I should know, I'm commenting on Slashdot.

Re:Since when?

[Richard Dick Head]

You designed a recursive irrelevancy algorithm there, unknowingly calling yourself out as well.

Re:Since when?

[afabbro]

Its called a straw man.

Set up false claims then demolish them in a fit of peek.

It's easy to POKE holes in your argument...

Re:Since when?

[Anonymous Coward]

> demolish them in a fit of peek.

Fit of pique.

A fit of peeking might get you arrested.

Re:Since when?

[zr-rifle]

What has this to do with the desktop? He is talking about CentOS (a distro commonly used on servers) and Django (a Web framework).

Re:Since when?

[mwvdlee]

The only way this recursive irrelevancy algorithm can be stopped is by somebody calling the previous post relevant, thereby improving relevancy of all prior posts.
But I'm not going to do it.

Re:Since when?

[Anonymous Coward]

I think you meant "Set up false claims then consume them in a fit of pica."

Re:Since when?

[hairyfeet]

Well good Lord, look who the guy who wrote the article in TFA is listening too, fricking Stephen J Nichols! Read some of his past "work" and it is pretty obvious he is a professional Linux troll. All he does is come up with one outlandish theory after another, all designed to stir up the shit and score page views no matter how crazy.

If you read Nichols history it can be summed up as thus: "X (insert Linux distro or Linux itself) is dying" "it is all a conspiracy by (insert usually MSFT but sometimes Apple or someone else) to kill Linux!" or "Because of X (insert product he's shilling for) THIS year will be the year of Linux on the desktop!"

He is just the Linux equivalent of Paul Thurott, professional Windows troll. The same way Thurott can be counted on to say anything that makes Windows debates epic troll threads with his total bullshit (Vista is great AND low resource? Really Paul?) the same can be said of Nichols and Linux. Everyone knows Debian isn't going anywhere, hell they've outlasted just about everyone that started at the same time for the love of Pete. This is just Nichols stirring up the shit, and the guy who wrote TFA either took the trollbait or was desperate for some page views.

Re:Since when?

[WaroDaBeast]

So, he's, like... Stephen J. Vaughan-Nichols version 3.0?

Re:Since when?

[somersault]

More like a declaration of a supposed observation.

Re:Since when?

[Alioth]

The firmware is still there, it's just been moved into the non-free repos (where it belongs because, well, it's non-free).

Re:Since when?

[somersault]

+1

I don't have any mod points, but you are a comedy genius

Re:Since when?

[Anonymous Coward]

ITYM "...a fit of pique..."

Re:Since when?

[binkzz]

And thats that. Server set up in 4 easy commands

Tsk. Gentoo only needs 3!

Re:Since when?

[bl8n8r]

> Who's calling it irrelevant?

RTFA courtesy of zdnet.

"I can see why Debian, while still popular as a building block for other Linux distributions, is no longer as important as it once was. "
Steven J. Vaughan-Nichols & Paula Rooney

Re:Since when?

[Terrasque]

You might want to have a look at pip and virtualenv.

In many cases, it lets you largely ignore what python-stuff is installed on the server, that you don't have root access, what package manager it use, and how outdated everything is.

It's still a bit of compiling going on, so you would need source packages for python and posgres (for pysocopg2) - but overall it's considerably easier (also, perfect for testing new versions of packages)

Example, to replicate a set of packages:

pip freeze > reqs.txt #dumps installed packages to the text file

pip install -UE newvirtenvfolder -r reqs.txt

and to activate the new virtenv (which is just a folder that you point env variables to):
source newvirtenvfolder/bin/activate

Re:Since when?

[MichaelSmith]

I have a cousin who is a version 3.0 and I have to say that having known 1.0 and 2.0, something is being lost with every generation.

Re:Since when?

[jimicus]

WTF is the point in having a distribution complete with sophisticated package management if the first thing you're going to do is basically ignore the whole lot and use some totally different system because the distribution's own packages are unsuitable?

Re:Since when?

[Anonymous Coward]

Probably because they switched /bin/sh from bash to dash? Which massively speeds up the boot time by the way.

The same thing's been done in Ubuntu too so it'd even happen on an OS with "more current software, easy installers, and flashing GUIs out of the box".

According to the people in #bash on freenode, if you're using bash specific features, you should use #!/bin/bash because there's never any guarantee that sh points at bash so your scripts can break in weird and mysterious ways.

Re:Since when?

[Terrasque]

You already answered your own question, actually : "because the distribution's own packages are unsuitable" - or things are not packaged.

Also, it lets me deploy my apps with no concern if the server is running debian stable, old debian stable, ubuntu, gentoo, slackware, fedora, centos, freebsd, osx, and even windows in some cases. And all of them will be running the same exact versions that I have tested and I know to be working well together.

It's easier, gives greater stability and flexibility, root access is no longer needed, and it's much easier to get an overview of all the packages the program use.

Yes, it is reinventing the wheel. But, like in the post I answered to, you can't know if the wheel is in a useful shape, and in some cases, if there's a wheel there at all.

Re:Since when?

[ThatsNotPudding]

News to me. Who's calling it irrelevant?

Steve Ballmer, Steve Jobs, Larry Ellison... you know; honest guys with no agendas or profit motivation.

Re:Since when?

[santax]

I have to say that I don't really agree with a lot of what is in that link. Debian has no drivers: well... you could add contrib and non-free to your apt sources list. Although I agree that Debian should have this option when installing. The user should be able to decide if they want the non-free apt sources. It's the first thing I do when I install Debian. Adding those. Because it really enhances the debian-experience. Ubuntu is indeed getting a lot of attention from the media. That's fine. But Ubuntu is a very slow version of Debian... I don't think that people using Debian will switch to Ubuntu because it will mean that your system will get slower. A lot slower. Ignoring all the things we hate about windows.... Like having to enter your password every time you want to do something. I also am pretty sure that if Debian would die tomorrow, Ubuntu would die the day after. They have a lot of good devs, but not on a kernel and system level. Ubuntu to me is an application layer on top of Debian. Also calling Debian a distro for linux-fanatics is somewhat weird to me... Debian is one of the easiest to use distro's ever.... Hell, most other distro's have a variation of apt-get these days and with good reason. It's a good system! Neh, if Debian would allow users the choice of automating the adding of non-free and contrib to their apt.sources they might be the new Ubuntu. Ubuntu is nice btw, nothing wrong with it, but it's like driving a Ford when you had a Mercedes if you compare the two. Ubuntu has 1 thing good though. Ubuntu is made to make switching from windows over to linux easy and it's really good at that.

Re:Since when?

[Randy_Leatherbelly]

Thurott is indeed a foul, foul troll, he's said some quite ridiculous things about Linux because he's a Microsoft shill, bought and paid for, indeed they bought his site. Not liking linux is fine, its not interesting or indeed any of my busines what OS anybody runs. but to spew forth his obviously ill-informed or mistaken 'opinions' for his paymasters, is purely lazy thinking, and disingenuous. he should stay playing his Xbox and cashing the check methinks.

Re:Since when?

[ThePhilips]

Steven Vaughan-Nichols is calling it "no longer as important as it once was". See http://www.zdnet.com/blog/open-source/the-new-debian-linux-irrelevant/8218

Taken out of context.

Debian as a user visible distro: less relevant.

Debian as a foundation for other distros: more relevant.

But yeah, article written in quite a trolling fashion. Probably Steven had too much of Ubuntu and now can't think anything but "ooh! shiny!!".

Re:Since when?

[johnw]

Perhaps he's like Windows... ...he'll only start to become useful at version 3.1

Re:Since when?

[Anonymous Coward]

For those of us that want a very stable and reliable server and don't want to have to deal with a bunch of garbage,

Uhh, Slackware, anyone?

Ok, but keep it in mind should Debian decide their work is indeed "irrelevant" & wander off into the weeds.

Personally, I think Debian should totally ignore emedia click-trolls & continue their great work.

[I'm only an Anon Coward 'cause I disdain the login requirement!]

Re:Since when?

[micheas]

Debian does give you the option of adding non-free when installing.

What it does not give you is the option of installing the patent encumbered multimedia codecs.

The latter is a result of US law, more than anything else.

Re:Since when?

[Capt.DrumkenBum]

You know someone will put you down for being logged in as root.

Shouldn't that be:
username@debian:~# sudo apt-get install postgresql-8.4-postgis
username@debian:~# sudo apt-get install libapache2-mod-passenger
username@debian:~# sudo apt-get install python-django python-django-south

Re:Since when?

[hairyfeet]

I just hate bullshit and trolls for BOTH sides equally. Both Thurott and Nichols are classic trolls, stirring up the shit with outlandish claims to stir up epic flamewars and score page views.

Just like you can be counted on for Thurott to say "I'm telling you that (insert name of MSFT product) is fricking wonderful! Linux sucks RMS's balls compared to this!" so can you count on Nichols to say "It is all a conspiracy by MSFT man! Linux can cure cancer while running on a 486SX while serving files to a fortune 500 company AND do all this while only using 2 watts of power! MSFT's software isn't fit to run a toilet!"

In both cases everything written is total bullshit carefully written and designed to piss one group or another off and cause epic flamewars, just classic troll bullshit. I've always been a "right tool for the job" guy myself and like you couldn't care what OS a person runs, but I fricking HATE pro trolls and shills. You probably can't find a single line by Thurott badmouthing Vista, just as you'll never see Nichols admit that Linux isn't for everybody. BOTH are shills and trolls of the worst order and the world would be a better place if neither were ever read again.

We have enough amateur trolls out there and here on /. for anyone to bring articles that are using the views of either Thurott or Nichols, thanks anyway.

Re:Since when?

[Eunuchswear]

Uh, if your prompt ends with a "#"...

ITYM:

username@debian:~$ sudo apt-get install postgresql-8.4-postgis
username@debian:~$ sudo apt-get install libapache2-mod-passenger
username@debian:~$ sudo apt-get install python-django python-django-south

Re:Since when?

[slackbheep]

And that's why it hasn't happened, You see the audience? ;)

Re:Since when?

[santax]

Help me out here, where does it do that? I have installed Debian many times but have never seen the option to add non-free and contrib to the sources list. Maybe I just missed it, but I would find that weird. For the codecs it's understandable to me. I add deb http://www.debian-multimedia.org/ to my sources for that. Good point btw, someone who is not a tech and just wants a pc that works will have great problems with playing vids on debian. That should be fixed asap.

Re:Since when?

[micheas]

If you are using the gui it is a checkbox item when you are chosing the location of your repositories (http, ftp, cdrom, etc.)

Re:Since when?

[micheas]

As to the debian-multimedia not being included, that will require either sanity about software patents from the SCOTUS or a clever work around. Actually, invalidating software patents in the USA would result in debian-multimedia being abandoned in about a week as everything would be merged into debian.

Re:Since when?

[BlackHole Basement]

You have to do an expert install to add it. I have not done a basic easy install in a llloooooonnnnggg time to comment on the add. From vague memory, it was not an option during basic installing.

Re:Since when?

[amorsen]

Its amazing to think that once upon a time Debian was considered behind the times.

The fact that you can find a system even further behind the times is not proof that Debian isn't...

CentOS is a lost cause; Red Hat Enterprise Linux itself is moving at glacial speeds (or rather, while the bandwidth is quite ok, the 5+ year latency is unbearable.) When CentOS is months behind RHEL even for security updates, it gets a bit ridiculous.

Re:Since when?

[robsku]

Well, since pip seems to be meant for installing *python* packages I will assume that it's to python something alike CPAN is to Perl - and I doubt that any linux repository out there will provide access to all that is available on CPAN... I would assume that, provided that I'm correct about pip, that it too will provide for python a wider set of packages than existing repositories (even though CPAN is simply humongous archive and PyPI likely much smaller) - and does that distro or even OS independently.

Re:Since when?

[Anonymous Coward]

You post reeks of ignorance and misunderstanding of what RHEL and its derivatives do and achieve. RedHat makes end-to-end solutions that target businesses and enterprises, not Web Hosting.

Also CentOS is out of date, RHEL is now up to version 6 and it has proper support for Python 2.6/3.

RHEL customers expect a bit more process and stabilisation for their money and RedHat targets their primary repositories as such. EPEL is not controlled by RedHat or CentOS and the package selection reflects that.

I love Debian

[Anonymous Coward]

Debian has been my flavor of choice for quite some time now; since Sarge. It is a solid distro with great features for the pro, and accessible to the newb.

Re:I love Debian

[LesFerg]

I have preferred it for some time, but it does have those little quirks that put it above newb access level still.

Really wish I could have done the last dist upgrade without it dropping my display settings and losing my drivers. Come on, who really cared if the kernel was relying on some 'non free' firmware, I wasn't protesting outside Debian offices about it. Sometimes they take this free crap too far.

No, aside from bitching about minor inconveniences, I still have to choose Debian for all serious installs (and Puppy for the other installs :)

Re:I love Debian

[eldepeche]

Debian cares, and it's their job to care. You should probably read the release notes before you upgrade between major versions.

I think the best way to draw attention to hardware that doesn't function without non-free drivers and firmware is to have a distribution that will take a principled stand against including such software. That way, you can try to install Debian on a computer and know exactly what is supported by free software.

Re:I love Debian

[icebraining]

Yes, how dare they stick to their principles if it annoys me!

They even host (unofficial) CD images with the non-free firmware, so I don't know what you're complaining about.

Re:I love Debian

[GigaplexNZ]

I think the best way to draw attention to hardware that doesn't function without non-free drivers and firmware is to have a distribution that will take a principled stand against including such software.

That distro is gNewSense.

Re:I love Debian

[Pikoro]

nice sig...

"Get out of my CHAIR!"

Re:I love Debian

[FuckingNickName]

"Freedom in the US is not the ability to do what you want. It is the ability to stop others from doing what THEY want"

tl;dr Property is theft.

Re:I love Debian

[Anonymous Coward]

that's just debian's way of filtering out morons who think it should behave like windoze ...and no its not a bug

debian is still my choice.

[drunkennewfiemidget]

I've sampled the others, and it just keeps working for me.

When other distros let me down -- even the debian based ones (like Ubuntu failing miserably over and over on my wife's netbook) -- debian, with the desktop set of packages installed, works beautifully.

Re:debian is still my choice.

[Jimmy King]

Same here. Hell, I'm deploying 7 Debian servers into our live environment tonight to replace some old RHEL4 servers at work.

Re:debian is still my choice.

[Anrego]

Personally I don't like Debian (gentoo user) .. but I do admit it drives a lot of open source.

And it does strike me odd that ubuntu is pulling off the Debian repos, but seems to take all the credit (best Debian ever gets is "it's based off Debian"). This is probably not intentional, and it makes sense (re-inventing the wheel should be avoided if reasonable) .. it just kind of "looks bad".

Re:debian is still my choice.

[Hatta]

I love Debian too, and run it on anything important. But Arch is more fun.

Re:debian is still my choice.

[SadButTrue]

Gentoo is easily the most clever distro name.

Re:debian is still my choice.

[cgenman]

In the early days, Ubuntu was basically framed as "Debian on a disk." Anyone in the know, knows that Ubuntu (like MEPIS and a lot out there) is based upon Debian. Debian is just stable, solid, and unencumbered enough to form the basis of a lot of good stuff.

And these days, who still uses Fedora? openSUSE? Mandriva? Ubuntu pretty much won the Linux desktop wars by finally providing something better than Windows (a no-install install). And on servers, you options are basically the stability obsessed gnomes of Debian, the Customer Support of Red Hat, the customization of Gentoo, or one of the purpose-built systems-in-a-box out there.

And who can forget the magical feeling the first time you typed "apt-get install koffice" from a raw command line with no shell, and the system just figured out all of the dependencies and installed an OS basically from scratch?

Re:debian is still my choice.

[Neil Boekend]

When I tried Kubuntu last it was missing some important parts, like a decent webbrowser and an office suite. I never really figured the package manager out: I couldn't find things based on a description, which meant I had to search the internet for a decent program that did what I wanted and continue to compare the lists (the programs that did what I wanted, found painstakingly, and the programs that were in the repository).
I went back to OpenSuse. If you finished the OpenSuse install the stuff you need is there. Yast is the greatest admin tool ever IMHO.

Re:debian is still my choice.

[drunkennewfiemidget]

gentoo is second to debian for me. As others have said, it just got to the point where maintaining things became problematic and time consuming. The fun part is when you go, 'oh, I missed a USE flag I'll need in the future.', you add it, and then wait while gentoo re-compiles the 136 packages that have now been changed by that use flag.

I understand that the rule with debian is pretty much everything is compiled with pretty much everything, but on a reasonably new system with good hardware I don't feel the need to get those few CPU cycles back.

Re:debian is still my choice.

[marcosdumay]

That is just a publicity stunt. People that fall for it would be too concerned to listen their software is based on something else (to the point of being afraid to install it) anyway, and by that date are not important for Debian. Later, some may learn a thing or two, and become relevant, by them they'll already know how things work.

It's too bad that publicity and truth are so opost to each other. But it is the way the world is, it should be stupid to deny it.

Re:debian is still my choice.

[Anrego]

I guess, but having an overclocked i7 and 6GB of DDR3 .. recompiling those 136 packages.. or the kernel because you need some obscure option.. is not the same big deal once was. I actually remember waiting for _DAYS_ to compile KDE libs. To be honest if that was still the case, I'd probably be using ubuntu at this point!

That said, performance was never my main motivator for using Gentoo. It was more the flexibility and general approach to things. Gentoo lets you just "do it" without trying to shovel high horse RMS mentality at you. I'm all for preference of open software to closed software, but let me make the decision. And sometimes you do need to use something that is closed because there is no reasonable open source equivilant. It's not as big a deal now with Debian (or so I hear) but back in "the day" you really had to fight your system to use Java. Then you really had to fight it to use sun's Java (it would seem to periodically try to install blackdown when doing an update). It was the same for a lot of "not free" software. And of course the whole firefox/iceweasel thing was rediculous .. and in general the Debian practice of mucking with packages well beyond what is reasonable (imo) kind of annoys me. I also prefer to start with a relatively empty system and add what I want.. rather than start with a loaded system and remove what I don't.

Ok.. that really wasn't supposed to be a troll/flamebait! Just kind of got on rant and kept going! Feel free to mod appropriately :)

Re:debian is still my choice.

[Hognoxious]

And who can forget the magical feeling the first time you typed "apt-get install koffice"

It's almost like losing your virginity.

Speaking as someone who runs only RH variants...

You can't just count packages and draw conclusions

[melted]

You can't just count packages and draw conclusions from counts. Some of the packages haven't been updated in years. Some are only used by like five users on the planet. Some are so buggy they won't even run.

Weigh them by how many people install and use them, and you've got something to talk about, though.

analogy

[hackstraw]

ubuntu is to debian as firefox is to gecko

Re:analogy

[Dopefish_1]

ubuntu is to debian as firefox is to gecko

Nobody uses Gecko directly. Debian isn't just a good base for building an operating system, it's a pretty good one already.

Re:analogy

[grumbel]

That is how it should be, but that is not how it is. Debian is not some generic distribution-construction-kit, but instead Debian is a complete normal independent Linux distribution and that is exactly where I see the problems. Ubuntu, just as the other distributions based on Debian, isn't a real Debian with a few extra packages installed, but a completely different thing, having its own complete package dependency tree that is incompatible to that of Debian. You might have luck installing Ubuntu packages on Debian or visa versa, but you might as well have not. There is no Debian base system to which developers can develop their packages that will then automatically be compatible with all Debian based distribution, you still have to build every package for every distribution.And thats really the crux, instead of having a unified base with which you can reach a large part of Linux users, you have heavy fragmentation. See for example the whole Launchpad auto builder infrastructure, great for building stuff for Ubuntu, but wanna build something for another Debian based distro or even Debian itself? Tough luck, that stuff is Ubuntu only.

At this point I would really welcome it when Debian would work towards becoming a proper base system for other distributions to build on in a proper way, not the kind of hacky one that is practiced today.

Re:analogy

[TBBle]

Ubuntu is to Debian as Stalin is to Lenin?

Re:analogy

[TBBle]

I think that'd be a terrible idea. The reason Debian works as a distribution base is because it's a complete, centralised, internally consistent and _working_ distribution guided by principles of end-user (admin) choice and unusually strict guidelines for package quality and interoperability, which make it fairly easy to drop new packages into the mix from random sources, mix-and-match packages already in the pool, and pre-decide things for your specific user base.

And you most certainly can build packages that'll work on every Debian-derived system, with a bit of care, and providing you don't need to rely on any packages whose ABIs have been forked downstream or have simply aged and been discarded from the repositories.

Sure, if you build something on Debian/unstable, you have no expectation that it'll work on Debian/stable, but if you build on the oldest distribution you care to support, a litte bit of effort with your dependancies should get you working on nearly-as-old distributions from other distributors, and you'll only be stopped from working on newer distributions when they don't provide a library ABI you need, in which case you need to build a version that works with _that_ ABI and so on.

Except where downstream distributions have created their own rules for shared library package naming, of course.

Re:analogy

[basotl]

I would say a better analogy would be:
Ubuntu is to Debian as Flock is to Firefox.

Re:analogy

[dudpixel]

ubuntu is to debian as firefox is to gecko

not really.

debian can still do all the things ubuntu can.

ubuntu is debian packaged for (possibly non-tech-savvy) end-users and polished a bit.

Re:analogy

[icebraining]

Derivative distros should adapt themselves to Debian, not the other way around.

See for example the whole Launchpad auto builder infrastructure, great for building stuff for Ubuntu, but wanna build something for another Debian based distro or even Debian itself? Tough luck, that stuff is Ubuntu only.

Maintainers can upload their source packages to Debian Mentors and get them into Debian, which will then be pulled by the other distros.
If the maintainer chooses to go through Ubuntu's incompatible platform, what are the Debian developers supposed to do?

Re:analogy

[domatic]

Pinning binary packages is a bad idea but source debs between whatever the current flavor of Ubuntu is and Sid/Testing are highly compatible. They should be. The bulk of Ubuntu is a snapshot of Sid that gets some QC and Ubuntu specific bits added. The few times I've wanted something newer that the Ubuntu repos had, I'd just build the Sid source deb in Ubuntu. apt-get build-dep is your friend here since of course the build dependencies and names are the same. There was one time Ubuntu had a newer spamassassin and I built an Ubuntu source deb and installed it on a Lenny Debian I was running but I generally do this in the other direction.

I basically treat Ubuntu as the QCed Sid snapshot that it basically is.

Re:analogy

[SudoGhost]

I think a better analogy is that Ubuntu is to Debian what HTC Sense is to Android.

Re:analogy

[ffreeloader]

ubuntu is debian packaged for (possibly non-tech-savvy) end-users and polished a bit.

Ubuntu is Debian packaged for (possibly non-tech-savvy) end-users and dumbed down a lot.

FTFY

Re:analogy

[Tupper]

ubuntu is to debian as firefox is to gecko

Debian has iceweasel, not firefox nor gecko, you insensitive clod.

Re:analogy

[Anonymous Coward]

Ubuntu is to Debian as Steven J. Vaughan-Nichols is to Alfred R. Schlimbacher-Huygens.

Re:analogy

[zoid.com]

No, more like Ubuntu is to Debian what Donald is to Daffy.

Re:analogy

[msauve]

I would really welcome it when Debian would work towards becoming a proper base system for other distributions to build on in a proper way, not the kind of hacky one that is practiced today.

I would welcome a cart able to push a horse, and Ambercrombie/GAP/DKNY should pay advertising fees to all those people wearing their clothes.

Re:analogy

[Anonymous Coward]

Göring! Get of my lawn!

Re:analogy

[Anonymous Coward]

I am the walrus....

Re:analogy

[nicholas22]

Ubuntu is to Debian as KFC is to foxes.

Re:analogy

[RichiH]

What the...?

It's nice that you enjoy mooching off of Debian, but some of us like to use Debian directly. Implying that Debian should limit itself so that others can more easily mooch is... strange?

Anyway, shouldn't Ubuntu, Mint, etc make an effort to properly base upon Debian, not vice versa.

But then, thankfully, Debian & Ubuntu devs are actually collaborating instead of simply going around, ranting about how you need to mooch moar.

Those people the article talked about, the ones who think Debian is irrelevant? You're one of them. Congrats, I guess.

Re:analogy

[MrHanky]

There still might be a point in there somewhere, as hardly anyone uses a "default" install of Debian (and there are several): it's designed for the user to tailor it to her needs. Ubuntu, OTOH, is a package designed to be usable for most people by default.

Re:analogy

[grumbel]

Implying that Debian should limit itself so that others can more easily mooch is... strange?

First of all, just because Debian should be able to provide a proper base system doesn't stop it from providing a full distribution. Secondly, the whole "base system" thing wouldn't just benefit Ubuntu, but also Debian, as it could clean up the whole base stable vs unstable issues, like say you want to install a unstable Gnome on a stable system, currently that would be quite a mess, if there would be proper decoupling between components on the other side, such a thing might very well be possible. And while at it, how about allowing to install two packages with different versions at the time? This is really not just about making things easier for Ubuntu, but getting rid of the whole monolithic dependency tree in general.

Re:analogy

[Anonymous Coward]

You might have luck installing Ubuntu packages on Debian or visa versa, but you might as well have not.

Visa versa? Is this when Visa pays interest to you on late payments?

Re:analogy

[RichiH]

> First of all, just because Debian should be able to provide a proper base system doesn't stop it from providing a full distribution.

I am intrigued. Define this "should" you are speaking of. What's the rationale? What's the incentive?

> Secondly, the whole "base system" thing wouldn't just benefit Ubuntu, but also Debian, as it could clean up the whole base stable vs unstable issues, like say you want to install a unstable Gnome on a stable system, currently that would be quite a mess, if there would be proper decoupling between components on the other side, such a thing might very well be possible.

What mess? Large installation or server: stable. Smaller installation or server: testing. Personal desktop: unstable. Works for me. Pick what works for you.

The claim that installing Gnome on Debian stable would be a mess proves that you didn't install Debian yet. Name any other desktop OS that has seen half as much stability testing as Debian and offers even half, or a tenth, the packages.

> And while at it, how about allowing to install two packages with different versions at the time?

Possible if the devs _want to_. Simply create package1 and package2 for versions 1 & 2. Libraries do this regularly. Debian's community does not like that, though. Especially the security team.

> This is really not just about making things easier for Ubuntu, but getting rid of the whole monolithic dependency tree in general.

Wait, what?
It's a graph, but that is not the matter here.

Every distribution has a graph of dependencies. The fact that the one of Debian happens to be the most stable and reliable one is a disadvantage, somehow?

Bollocks.

Re:analogy

[grumbel]

I am intrigued. Define this "should" you are speaking of. What's the rationale? What's the incentive?

The incentive? Cleanup up the distribution mess that Linux is and providing the best system possible?

What mess?

And then at one future day you might want to install a new piece of hardware or install a new piece of software not supported by the by now year old stable release. What are your options then? Either wait till the new stable is out, which could be month or years, or completly bypass everything Debian provides and manually hack stuff into the system. Thats what I call a mess. A proper system should allow you to install new stuff when you need it without dist-upgrading the whole system.

Name any other desktop OS that has seen half as much stability testing as

You are thinking to much in competitive terms. Just because other are worse doesn't mean Debian couldn't be a whole lot better.

Simply create package1 and package2 for versions 1 & 2

Thats not two versions of the same package but two different packages. Small, but very important difference.

Every distribution has a graph of dependencies.

Yes, that flaw isn't a Debian issue, it affects basically every Linux distribution out there.

To provide an analogy: Debian is basically the SVN of distributions, nice, solid, does 95% of what you want. I want the Git of distributions, that gives me all of that plus a lot of more freedom and less dependency on some single central repository.

Re:analogy

[RichiH]

> The incentive? Cleanup up the distribution mess that Linux is and providing the best system possible?

What mess? And where? Debian? The whole Linux distribution ecosystem?
Define "best"... what metric? Your notion of cleanliness?

> You are thinking to much in competitive terms. Just because other are worse doesn't mean Debian couldn't be a whole lot better.

The fact that it's the best (for _my_ metrics) does not mean that it can't be improved. Agreed. I just disagree that your ideas would make it better in any way I care about or can even come up with.

> Thats not two versions of the same package but two different packages. Small, but very important difference.

Indeed. And it ensures that proper dependencies graphs can be built. IMO, this is the better solution than a mix with unintended consequences.

> Yes, that flaw isn't a Debian issue, it affects basically every Linux distribution out there.

> To provide an analogy: Debian is basically the SVN of distributions, nice, solid, does 95% of what you want. I want the Git of distributions, that gives me all of that plus a lot of more freedom and less dependency on some single central repository.

Sorry if this sounds like an ad hominem, but you do not seem to be aware of how a Linux distribution works.

Package dependencies _must_ be a graph. No way around it.

Ignoring the fact that I have six different sources in my sources.list at this time and mix from them without problems, if you really want the git of distributions, I suggest you use the git of distributions: Exherbo.

Re:analogy

[grumbel]

Indeed. And it ensures that proper dependencies graphs can be built. IMO, this is the better solution than a mix with unintended consequences.

You wouldn't have any issues with dependency graph if you wouldn't lump everything into a single namespace.

Ignoring the fact that I have six different sources in my sources.list at this time and mix from them without problems,

Thats because you have been lucky, not because there is anything stopping one of those repositories from totally fucking up your system. What I am hinting at is a system where you could mix and match everything, enter Ubuntu in your sources.list, do "apt-get install ubuntu/gnome" and have that work fine without breaking your current Debian Gnome installation or the rest of the system.

Re:analogy

[RichiH]

> You wouldn't have any issues with dependency graph if you wouldn't lump everything into a single namespace.

I disagree. But the point is moot as I prefer one version over half a dozen versions.

> Thats because you have been lucky, not because there is anything stopping one of those repositories from totally fucking up your system.

No, it's because I know what I install from where, only using sources I can reasonably trust which are maintained by people who know what _they_ are doing.

> What I am hinting at is a system where you could mix and match everything, enter Ubuntu in your sources.list, do "apt-get install ubuntu/gnome" and have that work fine without breaking your current Debian Gnome installation or the rest of the system.

Insane workload, almost no benefit and, due to the halting problem, impossible to get right for everyone.
No thanks.

Re:analogy

[Anonymous Coward]

Except people know what Ubuntu is.

Re:analogy

[Anzhr]

+1

Re:analogy

[Anonymous Coward]

...and of course that isn't any fault of the Debian maintainers, but rather the maintainers of the offspring distribution (Ubuntu). If Canonical decides to base their distribution on Debian but then make it "incompatible" (though I've never had any problems dpkg'ing Ubuntu debs on Lenny) then that's their choice and the consequences of incompatibility are due to that choice, not any by the Debian maintainers. Also, from what I can tell the only situation where you going to come across problems using Ubuntu packages in Debian (and probably vice versa) is version dependencies, and you should (usually) be able to fix this by temporarily adding the experimental repository to Debian's sources, and as long as there aren't too many changes you should be able to avoid dependency hell. There's probably also other ways to get things to work if you're deperate, patient and conscientious enough (forums are always handy). Another simple way might be to have two boxes; one running Debian and the other Ubuntu :)

Debian seems to be one of (if not the) most mature and well organised and maintained distributions, and even if Canonical goes bankrupt I think there will always be Debian left for Ubuntu users to fall back on. Debian is like Ubuntu's older (and less gung ho) bro.

Re:analogy

[basotl]

Very true. It is an imperfect analogy but better than the original as far as actual relationships go.

I've never run "pure" Debian...

[IANAAC]

Mainly, I've just used Ubuntu and Studio 64. Sure, I realize they're Debian-based. I dont really make the distinction.

I have, however, read MANY comments on the evils of the very bits of default software that make me like Ubuntu.

Re:I've never run "pure" Debian...

[aliquis]

Keeping it free and open is evil? =P

Or stable and outdated?

If you want an open and stable distribution Debian works.

Re:I've never run "pure" Debian...

[IANAAC]

Keeping it free and open is evil? =P

That's not what I said. Nice try though. And you're kind of making my point.

Re:I've never run "pure" Debian...

[Anonymous Coward]

Dumb fucks like you are why most people can't be bothered with Linux.

Re:I've never run "pure" Debian...

[aliquis]

People aren't forced to use Debian. Either add non-free or install Ubuntu if you prefer that.

There's more than enough distributions for everyone.

The Debian people want to keep it clean, the Canonical people probably want it to work, atleast to a further extent. Though last time I ran Ubuntu you didn't had all the codecs, decss and such either, but nice wiki(?) entries which explained how to easily get them if you wanted to.

Re:I've never run "pure" Debian...

[wmbetts]

wow your anger can't be healthy...

re Debian Squeeze

[freddieb]

I have Squeeze running on a desktop and my home server. It is excellent. I have a Ubuntu desktop also. I really see no major difference except with Debian you don't have to update every two days to keep current. The long release cycle is excellent for servers. The new version has the latest bind, php 5.3, etc. Seems really current to me. It also plays Sirus player, compiz, software-center, just like debian. 2.6.27 compiled fine and runs like a top.

Re:re Debian Squeeze

[eldepeche]

The new version seems current, but it probably won't in a year and a half, when it will likely still be the current version.

Re:re Debian Squeeze

[Tubal-Cain]

The new version has the latest bind, php 5.3, etc. Seems really current to me.

For servers, sure. The desktop? Some applications, like Firefox, may technically be on the most recent stable release, but it will be over a year out of date–and remember, new FF release cycle after 4 gets comes out–by the time Debian 7 rolls around. And last I checked they still haven't put a beta of 4.0 in sid yet.

Re:re Debian Squeeze

[ffreeloader]

Why are you running 2.6.27 when Squeeze ships with 2.6.32 by default?

Re:re Debian Squeeze

[ffreeloader]

And this bad? Why? The point of a stable release is to be stable, not to introduce bugs by introducing new software into the system, and possibly major system changes. That can break a lot of stuff, and if you're running a server that's the last thing you need.

Re:re Debian Squeeze

[Tolleman]

I got scripts to download and compile the stuff I need when I go on new machines. So other then some basic X libs for dwm, git and a compiler. I really don't care what desktop apps a machine has. One command on any machine = my default desktop setup. Fairly handy.

Re:re Debian Squeeze

[jimicus]

That's what the FSM invented debian-backports for.

Re:re Debian Squeeze

[eldepeche]

Oh, I don't think it's bad, I just found it funny for someone to comment on how Debian seems current. Such a thing could only ever happen within a week of a release.

Re:You can't just count packages and draw conclusi

[blackraven14250]

I don't think many of the people using Ubuntu or other OSS are going to give permission for a package manager to snoop and send back this information.

proudly posted froom Debian 6.0

[Anonymous Coward]

that's it

Re:proudly posted froom Debian 6.0

[Elary]

Proudly posted from Debian 7.0 wheeze/testing
That's it.

Re:proudly posted froom Debian 6.0

[Cyko_01]

if you are "proudly posting" then why did you post as AC?

Re:You can't just count packages and draw conclusi

[Anonymous Coward]

You've just described the Debian Popularity Contest. It has a lot of users, although probably not a large proportion of all Debian users.

I run Ubuntu because it installs - Debian doesn't

[pepik_knize]

Every few years I get a new box, and I think, "I'll try Debian, people seem to like it." Then I try to install it, and it never installs properly. My experience has been that the installers over the years have been non-intuitive, required too much detailed knowledge, and were clunky. That's why I've never used it. Instead I've used Red Hat, Fedora, and now Ubuntu.

Re:Ubantu = Fail

[basotl]

Not sure how long Ubantu has been around... never heard of it.

Ubuntu on the other hand was first released 20 October 2004. Ubuntu is used by an estimated 12 million users and accounts for about 50% share of desktop Linux users.

I would take these numbers all a grain of salt as they are estimates from Canonical and others. Stats courtesy the Ubuntu Wikipedia article. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ubuntu_(operating_system)

Re:You can't just count packages and draw conclusi

[Anonymous Coward]

Why not? I always check send anonymous information. Oh shi- if it's just me doing it, it's not so anonymous now is it...

Re:Debia what?

[Anonymous Coward]

Nice troll, troll.

go back to 4chan please.

Gentoo?

[jasno]

People still use Gentoo? Wow! That was always my fav distro. How well is Gentoo being maintained nowadays?

I was actually thinking of trying Debian 'cause I figured Gentoo would have rotted over the last few years.

Re:Gentoo?

[clang_jangle]

Gentoo is in very fine shape these days, I'm using it daily!

Re:Gentoo?

[eldepeche]

I use Gentoo on my desktop. It works great, but it's kind of a pain in the ass if you don't upgrade packages regularly. I just moved, and I was only using my laptop for about 6 weeks. When I tried to upgrade, I got all kinds of dependency hell. It wasn't too hard to get everything resolved, but it seemed unnecessary.

Re:Gentoo?

[gringer]

Gentoo is in very fine shape these days, I'm compiling it daily!

FTFY

Re:Gentoo?

[Anrego]

It seems to have gotten a lot more polished over the last few years. A lot less "surprise, broken system" and fewer, more generic/sane use flags (but not so generic as to defeat the purpose).

Re:Gentoo?

[Anrego]

Totally.

I actually have a cron job that does a sync and an emerge _pretend_ .. then emails the results to me. I've found this works as a great "better update soon.. list is getting longer" reminder.

It does seem un-necessary.. but I guess that is part of the trade off. Gentoo is very flexible but fragile.. Debian is solid as a rock but less flexible. And we've gradually seen Debian become more flexible and Gentoo become less fragile.. but I think deep down you are always going to have this, just as a result of the mindset and core design of both distros.

Re:Gentoo?

[Anonymous Coward]

People still use Gentoo? Wow! That was always my fav distro. How well is Gentoo being maintained nowadays?

I was actually thinking of trying Debian 'cause I figured Gentoo would have rotted over the last few years.

As up to date and bleeding edge as ever :) (newer versions of portage are great also, fixed a lot of the minor issues with portage of old)

I host my servers using gentoo and everything from my P3 laptop (IBM thinkpad...no point upgrading, it still edits documents and code..and plays ut99 just fine) to my high powered desktop run gentoo these days. Can't really go back to getting a boxed distro once you've tried a meta-distro....all the best parts of rolling it yourself, with an amazing package manager to help you!

Re:Gentoo?

[Anonymous Coward]

Debian is much, MUCH easier to use than Gentoo. Installing WINE on a 64-bit netbook, for example, took about five hours in Gentoo. I installed WINE on my 64-bit Debian system, just to compare installation speed, in about a minute. USE flags are also a double-edged sword: there have been a few times I read an article about a cool feature of some program I already used, went to try it out, and realized I didn't have the right USE flags enabled for that feature to work. The vaunted speed increase... it's not so big on a modern system. There are a handful of applications Gentoo has that Debian doesn't, but the ones I've tried out so far have been a battery systray icon that doesn't require GNOME or Xfce, a Gtk theme engine (Sun's "Nimbus" engine - I meh'd), and a few lackluster games.

Debian still supports PowerPC

[joeyadams]

Debian is one of the last major Linux distros still supporting PowerPC (along with Gentoo, Arch Linux PPC, and a few others). Ubuntu discontinued official PowerPC support in 2007, and Fedora did the same in 2010. I'm tempted to install Debian 6 on my Apple eMac, replacing Fedora 12 (which reached EOL a couple months ago).

Re:Debian still supports PowerPC

[Anonymous Coward]

"A few others" - yeah, those no-name distros nobody cares about like RedHat, SuSE...

Re:Debian still supports PowerPC

[Anonymous Coward]

Ubuntu didn't discontinue powerpc. You can still get the latest and greatest powerpc ubuntu versions with regular security updates as normal as x86 and x86_64 versions.

The only difference is that you can't pay canonical for contract support for powerpc.

Re:Debian still supports PowerPC

[kwerle]

Wait - and that makes it /more/ or /less/ relevant?

Re:Debian still supports PowerPC

[Anonymous Coward]

They still do cdimages though http://cdimage.ubuntu.com/ports/releases/10.10/release/ if anybody's wondering

Re:Debian still supports PowerPC

[Anonymous Coward]

it's 'cause no one gives a shit about some retarded RISC architecture
even it's name sounds telemarketing-ish.
mod me as a troll, obviously i don't care (ac)
seriously though, you're being modded informative which basically means that the majority of readers didn't know about the ppc support, basically rendering it irrelevant as far as the pc market is concerned. and this is on a tech forum for people supposedly having much more expertise than the average joe who refers to the pc case as "the hard disk"

Re:Debian still supports PowerPC

[joeyadams]

More relevant, at least when your Core 2 Duo laptop dies and your old Mac suddenly becomes your best computer.

Re:Debian still supports PowerPC

[Anonymous Coward]

This is the reason I also chose Debian when I had to install it on some old iBook G4. Works pretty good too - only things I had to configure was adding the snd-powermac module for sound and install two packages for the Broadcom wireless adapter.

Problems with still trying to run a powerpc build include lacking support for things like flash (hey, it's still kinda an Apple...) and quite a lot of newer stuff that nobody bothers to make ppc versions of... and probably for the same reason I chose Debian: it's one of the only distributions to still support ppc. Using it for Android development would have been nice tho...

Re:Debian still supports PowerPC

[jonescb]

Isn't Yellow Dog Linux still around for PPC machines? It's based off either Fedora or Red Hat.

Re:Debian still supports PowerPC

[jedidiah]

Redhat and Suse are both corporate-centric payware oriented server distributions for people that need to run Oracle and make support calls and not be laughed at.

Re:Debian still supports PowerPC

[Anonymous Coward]

"Debian is one of the last major Linux distros still supporting PowerPC" Yes, it is. But development is agonizing slow and bugs (like the one in the installer that assigns the wrong kernel module to the particular PowerMac G4 (digital audio) that I have, so that sound doesn't work, never seem to get fixed.

Debian could position themselves as a viable alternative to OS X Tiger, which Apple has abandoned, so that Mac-centric school districts could still use their older G3 and G4 Macs instead of having to upgrade (with money they don't have right now) to Apple's latest and greatest. But, they would have to work on file and screen sharing so that it would be compatible with Bonjour. Probably not going to happen.

Re:Debian still supports PowerPC

[Yhippa]

Great idea. I've been looking for something to do with my eMac for a while now. Does anybody have any novel uses for theirs?

Re:Debian still supports PowerPC

[Anonymous Coward]

I'd recommend starting with LXDE (from the Xfce/LXDE install iso) or just netinstall and build your own system up from there - I know a few people doing that on their G3s very happily.

Re:Debia what?

[Nemyst]

Is this supposed to be sarcastic?

Debian is not Ubuntu's grandparent, that's a really bad analogy. If anything, Ubuntu's a leech (a very pretty leech, yes) to Debian. It's more of a symbiotic relationship than a true leech, but Ubuntu would have a very hard time to move forward without Debian's foundation and the work done by Debian developers. Chances are a LOT of Debian updates find their way into Ubuntu, so when the former updates, the latter benefits from it.

If Debian died today all the sudden, Ubuntu wouldn't grind to a halt, but it'd be struggling to keep its pace.

Ubuntu and Debian - they need each other

[inflex]

A lot of people are upset that Ubuntu doesn't give back a lot to Debian in terms of packages/software/whatever, however what Ubuntu gives Debian (and indeed Linux) is a more approachable OS package as a whole, something more suitable to the non-geek, this is something that Linux/Debian have never really bothered with a lot while in the realm of genuine geeks but it's something that Ubuntu adds and which is greatly appreciated by people outside of the geek circle. So while you cannot measure Ubuntu's 'give back' in quantitative terms it is still giving a huge amount in other areas where advancements were sorely needed.

I don't see the problem with Ubuntu being a Debian based distro - isn't this what Debian or any other distro would want - a larger adoption rate? It's all GPL, it's not like licences are being broken.. or is the crying from a minority more to do with a bad case of sour-grapes?

Re:Ubuntu and Debian - they need each other

[Anonymous Coward]

Agreed. Shuttleworth had a blog post about this very thing when that whole "ubuntu contributes less than anybody" thing went down: they're primarily focused on distribution, packaging (in the non-Linux sense of both words) and polish. To suggest that they don't contribute lines of code is missing the point of their contribution to the community at large.

That said, I'm becoming less and less satisfied with Canonical's way of doing these very things and have just installed Debian (via Mint's new version thereof). Not too shabby. So take THAT for whatever it's worth.

Re:Ubuntu and Debian - they need each other

[Anonymous Coward]

"what Ubuntu gives Debian (and indeed Linux) is a more approachable OS package as a whole,"

Says who? By what metric?

This is all just Ubuntu marketers tooting their own horns (when they can't get dupes like yourself to give them a good toot for free).

Debian is eminently usable and continues to be so. Ubuntu is just bullshit-brown marketing and purple-prose propaganda.

Re:Ubuntu and Debian - they need each other

[Anonymous Coward]

No, that's not want Debian or any other distro would want. In commercial software (whether open source or proprietary), of course market share's a big thing. It can be big for some ego-driven non-commercial stuff. But if one is driven by a desire to scratch ones own itch, or goes ego-wanking on the basis of "best", not "most popular", it's completely irrelevant, if not (on the principal that you can only get mass appeal by catering to the LCD) actually negative.

Linux works on my desktop, why should I care whether it's ever "the year of Linux on the desktop" for everyone else? And sure, if you braindamage Ubuntu in the name of userfriendliness, at least it doesn't hurt Debian users or devs, but I can't see how it does them one bit of good, either.

That's not to justify people actually getting mad about Ubuntu's "taking from" Debian and not giving back -- it is open source, after all, the whole point is that others can do whatever they want with it, but your argument that Ubuntu giving "human beings" whatever it is they want in a brown desktop OS and so amassing Ubuntu users is somehow "giving back" to Debian is pure bullshit.

Re:Ubuntu and Debian - they need each other

[bsquizzato]

You can appreciate Ubuntu in the geek circle too. As a QA engineer I troubleshoot broken software all day -- while Linux is useful for my job as a desktop OS, I don't want to waste time troubleshooting it too.

Ubuntu (usually) installs great and is up and running quickly out of the box. When stuff goes wrong, I have all the Ubuntu forums just a quick search away (usually with a pretty quick answer).

Re:Ubuntu and Debian - they need each other

[elashish14]

Ubuntu may not contribute that much back to Debian in terms of code, but at the very least, if they become profitable at some point, it would be great if they could use some of that cashflow to fund the Debian project (if they don't already). I think that's where they have a lot (if not the most) to offer.

Re:Ubuntu and Debian - they need each other

[Anonymous Coward]

i can say this, as a serious geek in the real world. I been using linux since the mid 90's first with Slackware then bouncing back and forth between RH and SuSe, then experimenting with Gentoo. I for one love what Ubuntu has done for linux and debian for that matter. I no longer get a hard on compiling my own programs for the ultimate speed, however, i do take pride in using open source for my daily work. Having packages available when i need them and they work without having to deal with dependencies and waiting for compiling. Yes, the speed is nice but in the real world when work has to be done lets face it apt-get install is conventient. We can get work done without compiling or resorting to MS. There are no extra points for using OS just satisfaction.

Re:Ubuntu and Debian - they need each other

[inflex]

I have heard that a lot of the Debian developers are already on the Ubuntu payroll; I don't have sources to cite though.

Re:Ubuntu and Debian - they need each other

[inflex]

That basically reflects what's happening here, though I stuck hard with Slackware till about 2006 and I just couldn't be bothered anymore having to recursively chase down and build from source to install new versions of packages that weren't in the Slackware repository.

If there's a specific program that I feel isn't performing as good as it could, then I'll consider pulling down the source and building it with optimal settings for my hardware but that's really at a push. Even with these puny Atom 1.6GHz machines things are plenty fast (doing GIMP, Inkscape, Eagle PCB and other electronics work) with the standard builds.

It's nice to be able to just apt-get install stuff and get to actually using them to do what you want.

Re:Ubuntu and Debian - they need each other

[Anonymous Coward]

Ubuntu needs Debian. Debian doesn't need Ubuntu. At the very least, Canonical can sponsor some key Debian devs on a regular basis. If Unbuntu shut up shop today, it wouldn't affect Debian in the slightest. You can't claim the reverse.

Re:You can't just count packages and draw conclusi

[hidden]

debian has a package called popularity-contest, which it asks to install when you do a new debian install. from the package description:

Description: Vote for your favourite packages automatically
  The popularity-contest package sets up a cron job that will
  periodically anonymously submit to the Debian developers
  statistics about the most used Debian packages on this system.
  .
  This information helps Debian making decisions such as which packages
  should go on the first CD. It also lets Debian improve future versions
  of the distribution so that the most popular packages are the ones which
  are installed automatically for new users.

Re:You can't just count packages and draw conclusi

[Anonymous Coward]

Popularity contest statistics for popularity-contest says that 99.76% of the almost hundred-thousand Debian users sending statistics back to the "popularity contest" have installed the application which gathers such statistics.

Re:You can't just count packages and draw conclusi

[Tubal-Cain]

You can't just count packages and draw conclusions from counts. Some of the packages haven't been updated in years. Some are only used by like five users on the planet. Some are so buggy they won't even run.

Maybe, but if a Debian package out of date, uncommon, or unusably buggy, then I expect that Ubuntu would not import it or pull from the upstream project. You know, the packages the summary is talking about.

Re:You can't just count packages and draw conclusi

[TBBle]

Dammit, forgot to log in. >_

Re:You can't just count packages and draw conclusi

[TBBle]

And check the preview. >_<

Congratulations to the Team for Excellent Work

[Frank J Kime JR]

Let me say that the Debian team has My deepest thanks for a job well done. I am a user of distro Linux because of the periodic search for bandwidth (and of course to host my endless emails of viagra ads.) The Debian team should be studied from the perspective of package compatibility and strong support of Aptitude. Support is due to the proper application of (or perhapss luck) over the years of use in the package management. I know you kids love compiling kernels and it makes me sigh with appreciation for youthful energy. My need is to slam into another account, setup a complicated gizmo and let the freedom of speech reside. But somehow the setup is pretty capible of supporting obscure configurations without alot of effort. Thats a distro folks, for my opinon. Of course Ubuntu is nice for sitting on the console ... For a remote, Debian is my #1.

Re:why debian is irrelevant:

[Narcocide]

SNS (Shiny New Shit syndrome) is a very serious condition that can negatively impact the reliability of your computer.

Re:Ubantu = Fail

[icebike]

I would say those estimates are not unreasonable. You probably have to assume that Kubuntu and Xubuntu and Edubuntu contribute to those numbers too, as they all draw from the same repositories.

I've long used Opensuse, but for joe user, Ubuntu is probably one of the easiest to install and keep up to date, especially when you can start with an LTS version.

Re:I run Ubuntu because it installs - Debian doesn

[HPUXCowboy]

As noted in the article, Debian has never been a distribution that was built for the masses. Yes, some detailed knowledge of the hosting hardware is required. But this is nothing new. It's always been a distro for the more savvy user I.E. your down and dirty geeks and serious developers/administrators.

While some complain loudly about the release schedule (?) that Debian is famous for, it is this very attention to detail that makes each new release of Debian one the most stable in the Linux world.

While Debian does not ooze with the WOW! factor like Ubuntu and many others, it is Debian that enables these other distros to prosper. Without the solid platform furnished by Debian the many derivative distros would would find it very difficult at best and nearly impossible at worst to maintain their aggressive release schedules.

I use Ubuntu. It seems to have problems getting along with the sound hardware on my machine (something I never saw while using pure Debian) but, overall it's a good distro. However, if you have experienced the "pure Debian" distro there is no doubt regarding Ubuntu's ancestry.

Enough with Debian

[Murdoch5]

Debian and debian derived projects are for people that are to lazy to use a real Linux system. Any Linux user who is lazy enough to rely on the binary Linux distro's are really just admitting they don't actually want to put the time into learning source based Linux.

Ubuntu well the most popular distro is becoming so much like Windows it's disgusting, Any ubuntu based distro is just ripping off a poorly designed root. Debian might matter in the grand scheme being it's one of the big distro's that started off Linux but now it's a bloated Linux distro which spawns children that aren't bringing Linux's best features to table.

If you want to call yourself a Linux user, take a LFS cd and start compiling, if your not going to make your own distro using LFS then grab a good distrobution that actually makes Linux use act the way it's meant to be used. Slackware, Gentoo, Rock, T2 are all great distro's because they force the user to actually know thats going on with there system and care about how there system works. Ubuntu on the other hand cares more about how the user can use there webcam or get on facebook then about how the system runs.

The binary vs source argument has been long made and long argued but the fact is that you CAN NOT get the performance specs out of a binary distro and that just doesn't seem right, at least to me. When you have the chance to get your hardware to run faster and run with the exact feature you dictate then why wouldn't you choose that path. If you experienced then it's not alot of work to learn how, if you learning how then it's worth the time to learn the right way, Once you know the right away your not going to want to go to the debian style distro's unless your lazy and if your lazy then don't use Linux.

Linux is meant for computer users who care and when you go binary your not caring your just using and that is not a good methodology to live by.

Re:Enough with Debian

[Anonymous Coward]

Using your criteria, I cared about Linux in 95-96, starting with Slackware. 80% of my time was spent doing the following:

1) "Hey, foo has come out! I hear it's awesome!" ./configure. "foo requires barlib5.2.1."
2) Find barlib5.2.1. ./configure. "barlib5.2.1 requires balib2.1.3, bolib6.8, parlib 3.9"
3) Find balib2.1.3 from some random website being maintained by god-knows-who. "balib2.1.3 requires teelib 8.1"
etc.

Recursively discovering, downloading, and compiling the 500 source libraries required in order to make configuring of a Makefile not choke just to get one app to work. Dealing with X configurations was not fun, and dealing with researching in order to (hopefully) answer 800 kernel questions was not fun.

My greatest "joy" of that period was compiling/installing a newer glibc and managing to annihilate my system. I remember going onto IRC asking how to go about repairing this and met with the answer of "In the future, don't do that!" (This is back when metacrawler was the King of search engines, and finding help wasn't always easy).

Over the years, after moving from Slackware to Redhat to Fedora to Ubuntu, I am incredibly thankful that I no longer have to "care" about Linux anymore. Give me my performance hit for the sake of convenience. I'll gladly take it over the alternative.

Re:Enough with Debian

[Anonymous Coward]

Perfect example of the kind of arrogance and hostility that puts people off of Linux and open source in general.

Congrats.

Re:Enough with Debian

[Anonymous Coward]

You really spend that much time compiling software instead of having sex?

Re:Enough with Debian

[HPUXCowboy]

Let the flame wars begin!

I have been developing software for, and administering, computers for the last 30+ plus years on systems ranging from the old proprietary SuperMini's of the 1980's to the high powered HP and Sun systems of today.

I've been using Linux since kernel version 0.9x. I've have used Slackware, Mandrake, Red Hat, Debian, Gentoo, Suse and Ubuntu as well as OpenBSD (BTW, the build system in Gentoo smells suspiciously like the system that has been in place in the various *BSD distros for years). I have spent many a night building packages and custom kernels just because I like to play with 'em.

My point is, there is room for everybody in the Linux universe. To loudly complain that people who use a binary based distro "are to lazy to use a real Linux system" is to display a pure lack of consideration for everyone who is not "A True Geek (tm)". To display such an intolerance toward the many people who make up the current and future user base for Linux reveals the very attitude that has prevented Linux from making significant inroads into the casual user segment of the market until very recently.

To imply that "I'm better than you" because you like to build your own distro only serves to continue to fan the flame wars and insult the intelligence of the casual user. However, these casual users are the very reason that FOSS exists.

If you desire to be an ubergeek, please feel free to do so. That's what Linux, and Open Source Software is all about. However, Linux is ALSO all about giving the casual computer user a choice ... preferably a choice that is more secure that M$ could ever hope to be. But make room for the Joe Public too.

Re:Enough with Debian

[Narcocide]

Since when is the whole world required to pander to your fragile and easily bruised ego? I'm sorry but the "I can't use Linux because everyone is mean to me." argument is starting to get a little old. How about taking responsibility for your own incompetence for once? How about sitting down and reading the documentation on your own to find out what makes them think they're all so much better than you? Or did you think literacy would not be an important factor in your ability to comprehend advanced technology?

Re:Enough with Debian

[Anonymous Coward]

Let's say you're right. Would you like to point out what documentation Alan Cox should have read in order to have avoided that whole TTY subsystem public chastising from Linus? Was Linus' response acceptable considering who he was talking to and the contributions he's made in the past? Would you accuse Alan Cox of having a "fragile and easily-bruised ego" considering how long he's been sitting around the open source community?

Re:Enough with Debian

[RichiH]

> BTW, the build system in Gentoo smells suspiciously like the system that has been in place in the various *BSD distros for years

FreeBSD calls its package eco-system ports, Gentoo calls it portage. This is not a coincidence.

Re:Enough with Debian

[Viol8]

Programs that require endless obscure libraries are written by lazy and.or incompetent coders who do lego brick style programming. When the start they don't ask themselves "How can I code this?", they ask themselves "What libraries do this?" and what you end up with is a bit of glue code requiring a dozen obscure libraries just to play an mp3 or whatever.

"after moving from Slackware to Redhat to Fedora to Ubuntu,"

Slackware is very much install and go now. The days of recompiling the kernel or manually hacking xorg.conf files are long gone. Of course you can still do that if you want. I installed Slack 13.0 on 2 quite recent laptops and it Just Worked on both of them , including wifi.

Re:Enough with Debian

[Terrasque]

If you want to call yourself a Linux user, take a LFS cd and start compiling, if your not going to make your own distro using LFS then grab a good distrobution that actually makes Linux use act the way it's meant to be used. Slackware, Gentoo, Rock, T2 are all great distro's because they force the user to actually know thats going on with there system and care about how there system works.

Been there, done that. Have you ever customized a system to run on a 486 with 4mb ram, and run X? Have you set up your own bsd-based ARM router appliance (soekris) with VPN? Set up a memory-sharing computing cluster of some old boxes because it seemed like a fun thing to do?

It was fun, learned a lot, but I ultimately came to the conclusion... It's all just a big waste of time, really. It stops being fun, and you realize it's as pointless as dangling your balls in a piranha pool just to show how good you are (and for those of you that disagree, heres a fact for you : Your balls, and fish with sharp teeth are just not meant to be mixed. Doing that makes you an idiot, not a macho).

Now, my goal is just to get from A to B in the least amount of time, with the least frustrations on the way. If you thinks that makes you so much better than me, then you're just a silly bugger, and after a while, you'll realize the same.

Re:Enough with Debian

[marcello_dl]

Debian and debian derived projects are for people that are to lazy to use a real Linux system. Any Linux user who is lazy enough to rely on the binary Linux distro's are really just admitting they don't actually want to put the time into learning source based Linux.

Source based linux is for people too lazy to code their own OS in assembler. Problem, compilefag?

Re:Enough with Debian

[Murdoch5]

That would work but I have ........... in OS class it was like 2000 lines of x86 assembler. Then I rewrote it in C to see the speed difference.

Re:Enough with Debian

[Murdoch5]

I had to use ASM because the timer's we had were buggy in C and kept skipping every few days on the time period, I'll dig the code up and send it to you.

Re:Enough with Debian

[Murdoch5]

Fair enough, your points work. However I have ported some projects to run on different hardware. I love people that seem to read this line about me being better then them, which it never says in my post. If someone wants to quote it for me word for word then then I'll shut up but they can't because it never actually says that anywhere. So just for the record people can read this:

I'm NOT better then anyone, just I run better Linux distro's

Re:Enough with Debian

[socrplayr813]

Debian and debian derived projects are for people that are to lazy to use a real Linux system.

Or perhaps for people whose time valuable to them.

I also really don't care if my computer is 5% faster with my own distro vs. Debian. The time it would take me to get that running is not worth the miniscule amount of extra time it takes for my browser to open and my email to load.

Re:Enough with Debian

[Risen888]

"If you want to call yourself a Linux user, take a LFS cd and start compiling, if your not going to make your own distro using LFS then grab a good distrobution that actually makes Linux use act the way it's meant to be used."

1. I don't think the kernel has an opinion.
2. You can't spell, your grammar is terrible, and your sentence structure is abhorrent. English fail.

Re:Enough with Debian

[Murdoch5]

I know I can't spell and I know my grammar is horrible, but thats what happens when you have a learning disability. If you want to write a book have fun, I don't. You apparently can't read in any capacity other then to correct my spelling and grammar. You just like every other person to respond has managed to pull sentences and quotes out of my post which don't exist. I never said the kernel has an opinion. It's one thing to have bad spelling it's completely another to see sentences and quotes which don't exist. Clearly your in the group of people who see the sentences which aren't there, get some help!!!!!

Re:Enough with Debian

[cinderellamanson]

I have Linux From Scratch on my Dell Inspiron 1545, the CD needs hammered into place, i have moved source code into the new system, i had trouble copying files to my vfat thumb drive from OBSD, so I used my Mac at work and gave my coworker a list of systems that will help with a command line server, stuff like screen, told him to look for a cli version of pidgin, email, browser, mc, etc. OBSD runs my desktop development environment, including selected bits from gutenberg, tldp, ocw.mit.edu, OBSD documentation, All RFCs, I don't have DMOZ, nor wikipedia, but the LFS system is not complete so there you go. OBSD runs black box, imagemagick, lynx, vlc, xpdf, python 2, wxpython, and some of the above options. Open BSD is chosen for it's stability and lfs for it's flexibility. They compliment each other well. and my desktop is clearly transferable to LFS and vice versa.

I also have the long now foundations rosetta disk http://blog.longnow.org/2008/11/03/macro-to-micro-etching/ on dvd. My friend's list on myspace is an approximation of advogato's trust metric that verifies cultural significance within that web site (it's old right now, almost a photograph, but significant). On my book shelf I have the ashley book of knots and the CRC handbook of chemistry and physics.

I have all of the presidential addresses as well as the us constitution. In a way, in a zombie apocalypse, I carry the sum total of human knowledge as available online.

I still need to write a package manager though.

Re:Enough with Debian

[Risen888]

"I know I can't spell and I know my grammar is horrible, but thats what happens when you have a learning disability."

That sort of thing runs in my family as well. Please accept my apology.

"I never said the kernel has an opinion."

That was hyperbole on my part. However, you certainly did talk about "how Linux is meant to be used," and "the right way" to use Linux, statements which simply have no basis in fact. Just because that's how you prefer to operate doesn't make it the "right way" or any other way the "wrong way."

Re:Enough with Debian

[Murdoch5]

I like you post, Thanks for your reply. To be correct i should really change the post I made to read my preferred GUN / Linux setup and not the generic. I respect your view point.

Re:Enough with Debian

[cinderellamanson]

I write like shit when I'm tired.

Re:Enough with Debian

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: "lazy and.or incompetent coders who do lego brick style programming"

You might be interested to know that *nix was founded on what I think you are comparing to "lego brick style programming"

From http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unix_philosophy

"Make every program a filter."
"Rule of Modularity: Write simple parts connected by clean interfaces."
"Rule of Composition: Design programs to be connected to other programs."
"Rule of Optimization: Prototype before polishing. Get it working before you optimize it."
"Rule of Diversity: Distrust all claims for "one true way"."

Also, have you ever heard of "DLL hell"? What do you think all those DLL files on a Windows machine are for? In most cases they don't work on their own. They are effectively similar "lego bricks" you refer to that used by other "lazy incompetent programmers".

Re:Enough with Debian

[Anonymous Coward]

"compilefag"... roflmfao

the ultimate geek insult

love it

Re:Enough with Debian

[Anonymous Coward]

$ sex
bash: sex: command not found

or...

**** COMMODORE 64 BASIC V2 ****
64K RAM SYSTEM 38911 BASIC BYTES FREE
READY.
LOAD SEX

PRESS PLAY ON TAPE

Quiet! You Fools!

[havardi]

Let Debian do it's collectivist work in the shadows, and Canonical can provide the capitalist facade that keeps Them at bay. . . This arrangement might be its only hope for survival. Voluntary virtual-subjugation? Since data, unlike food, can be copied endlessly-- this might be a pretty good arrangement. Until it isn't, anyway.

Re:Debia what?

[Nerdfest]

Ubuntu wouldn't exist without it, and the Debian contributers deserve a big "Thank you" for their contribution to fantastic software that you can use for free.

Re:why debian is irrelevant:

[Anonymous Coward]

2 years is sooo little that windows xp users (the dominant DESKTOP OS) waited 10 to upgrade to windows 7.
So, in servers it's easy... you need stability, so debian's 2 years release cycle it's at least perfect (And I have debian servers 4.0 still running over 3+ years). And with desktop users... the real "grandma user" doesn't want new features every 3 months. They want to learn as little as possible, and not change any kde version or gnome or switch from pidgin to a broken and incomplete empathy or moving their photos from fspot to the next big thing and from using rhythmbox to banshe...
Don't you see how irrelevant is to have new versions of software for real end users??? how annoying is for them?

Re:why debian is irrelevant:

[Anonymous Coward]

More like "a newer version fixes that critical bug... but we won't backport it".

Re:You can't just count packages and draw conclusi

[icebraining]

How the hell do the other 0.24% report them?

well...

[Charliemopps]

Cars are 90% horse carriages repackaged with some added features (an engine.) So really, carriages are still very much relevant.

You can count packages and draw conclusions...

[Anonymous Coward]

the conclusion is that Debian has tons of packages! More than anybody else.

I have been using Debian for 15 years on sparc, ppc, i386, amd_64, and arm. I don't know what you are talking about broken packages. Bugs exist, but I have a zillion times more use of Debian than Red Hat, and have seen fewer bugs in Debian than I have found in Red Hat (which also has next to zero packages in comparison, supports few architectures, and has horrible upgrade options). I have boxes that started out as potato that are still running today with lenny.. all just apt-get dist-upgrades-- this is impressive as hell to me!

As for software only used by 5 users on the planet, I might be one of those 5 users, and I appreciate that it is packaged, and simple to install and use. I had to f'ing build clamav from source for RH 4?! WTF? somehow I think clamav is used by more than 5 people.

I think the derivatives of Debian are targeting new users coming mainly from windows. this is fine, but I don't want my experience dumbed down, nor do I want to be forced to install some crappy bloatware windows emulating desktop like gnome or kde. I will stick with deb, and for those who want it, ubuntu and others give the canned experience while benefiting from Debian's careful processes, huge software library, and amazing package management infrastructure.

Also, software is as fresh as you want it with debian without having to run an unstable system using bleeding edge for everything. Their package management system is the best there is. With pinning, you can run stable, testing, unstable, experimental, volatile, etc. on the same system without anything unexpected happening. Just need to learn to use the tools.

Also, Deb packaging all that software means you get manpages for that app regardless of your distro... Debian maintainers create manpages if none exist upstream-- I've seen these Deb manpages on other distros... which is great for everybody.

Re:You can count packages and draw conclusions...

[skids]

There's still some work to do on cultivating a bit of coordination between sets of packages. E.g. they managed to hose my BOINC cluster NFS shares by dropping aufs NFS export support before there was a viable replacement (unionfs seems to take an asymptotic path towards full completion). They decided as a matter of policy to not fix that, because aufs NFS isn't especially high quality code... gee thanks, all of us who were just using it to run junk clusters don't exactly need data center quality. But that's life in unstable... things break more often on the bleeding edge.

This pales, however, in comparison to the hell I watch the sysops at work go through with RedHat/CentOS.

Re:You can count packages and draw conclusions...

[marcosdumay]

"nor do I want to be forced to install some crappy bloatware windows emulating desktop like gnome or kde"

That nails down another thing about Debian. I just don't want to run some bloatware at servers, thank you RH and SUSE. I also don't want that server to start missbehaving from times to times just because I didn't use the (GUI) distro sanctioned config application. Config application? WTF if you want to make some application that makes my life easier, thank you (but I probably won't use it if it is a GUI), but oblying people to use those applications is another thing completely, and making them GUI based, and not scriptable is stupid.

On the desktop, by the other side, I like KDE (3, didn't try 4 yet but will probably update now that squeeze is out) quite well.

Debian and Ubuntu - an ideal symbiosis

[retrospectenlighten]

I'm always a little concerned what might happen if Ubuntu became too much of its own ecosystem - and started to drift away from its Debian roots. According to the text "only 7% of Ubuntu is directly derived from upstream projects, Canonical's projects, or other non-Debian sources". Just about the worst thing that could happen to Debian is a fork (and the enhanced probability lies squarely in Ubuntu's lap).

In a way, Debian and Ubuntu provide an ideal symbiosis - the sober one to ensure the party animal turns up to work the next day, but also a good time is had by all.

My greatest concern is if Canonical and friends stopped driving/upstreaming improvements, a wholesale migration would be encouraged. And then we only have Ubuntu (and friends of course) - and once the symbiosis is broken it's very hard to put back together.

I smelled this in 2009

[Anonymous Coward]

Ubuntu is just a deviant fork that is stealing development from Debian,
Unless the dist has features that place it another space such as real-time or process control
creating a distribution that is just a re-packaged rip-off is wrong.

I have never liked ubuntu, it's like riding a bike with training wheels.

Re:I smelled this in 2009

[Anonymous Coward]

If Ubuntu is a deviant fork of Debian, what does that make Iceweasel?

Debian: more relevant than Steven Vaughan-Nichols

[DougReed]

I use Ubuntu because it is the 'Apple' of Linux distributions. ... it just works... I even violate my Linux roots sometimes and configure stuff through the GUI. I think it is Steven Vaughan-Nichols who is not relevant. And it it were not for Debian, there would be no Ubuntu.

Yes, yes, I know that Red Hat works too, but it just doesn't DO anything. RPMs that won't install. An ugly incoherent out of date GUI. configured for security ... meaning you should consider yourself privileged that it actually lets you login.

Who is deb ian and what is *ubuntu?

[Anonymous Coward]

Question from Slakware user since 90's.

But seriously, TFAuthor of TFA didn't bother to check distrowatch. HPD of Ubuntu is 2096 and Debian's 1244. That is not less relevant.

Re:why debian is irrelevant:

[mirix]

If you want bleeding edge, you run sid, not stable.

debian is better for n00bs

[tonytraductor]

Personally, I don't understand why people claim that Ubuntu is more "user-friendly". I tried ubuntu for about a year before finally taking the dive into Debian (had used Fedora/RH for 8 years prior, but finally got tired of yum breaking stuff). Stuff broke on Ubuntu (not as much as Fedora!), and I wasted time fixing it. I installed Ubuntu for a few n00bs, friends who were tired of their virus/crash ridden XP, etc. They all became frustrated, because, well, stuff broke, and they didn't know how to fix it. Now, when my Mom got an old computer from a friend, a 400hmz PII with like 128mb ram, I installed Lenny on it for her. It's run great ever since, without a single problem (time to go update her to Squeeze, though). I've been using Debian on all my desktops now for about 2 years, upgraded to Squeeze last weekend. The most trivially easy, seamless upgrade ever. (can't be said of ubuntu's frantic release schedule, where every new silly snake release breaks more stuff). Nothing ever breaks in Debian. I haven't had a single software problem since making the move, and I can't imagine ever moving away, now. It's rock-solid, impregnable, and it just works. I don't get what's supposedly so "user-friendly" about Ubuntu. For one thing, I kind of agree with Tuomo Valkonen about "usability" anyway. Do what I want, only what I want, and stay out of the way. Ubuntu makes too many decisions for the user, and not always good ones (usually tying a ton of bloat together in "metapackages" in such fashion that you can't remove some useless crap like, say , cowsay, or something, without removing your entire window manager). Debian allows me to install what I need, precisely, no more no less. And for n00bs, it doesn't break and cause problems.

Re:debian is better for n00bs

[tonytraductor]

I continued to use ubuntu on some laptops, netbooks, but eventually installed debian on those, too (although the netbook is now running peppermint os, as an experiment, since it's not a mission-critical production machine).

Re:debian is better for n00bs

[orange47]

most of the time, when I have a problem in Debian, solution is found in Ubuntu forum.

Re:debian is better for n00bs

[mikael_j]

My experience is that the Ubuntu forums rarely are much help since a lot of the advice that gets passed around there is cargo culture advice.

Basically, if you tell them "Hey, a system update borked my Xorg install and a bunch of other stuff in the following way: .... Has anyone else experienced this? Any tips on how to fix this?" you're likely to get "Open up Synaptic and click..." as a response by some twit who fails to understand that No Xorg => no GUI => no Synaptic.

Re:debian is better for n00bs

[Anonymous Coward]

I do remember being also quite frustrated getting it to work 2 years ago, but modern day ubuntu really is much better and easier to install. I have done it on a couple of computers now, and it compares with a windows 7 install ( short of having to free some space for the file system if the rig is windows based ).

Re:debian is better for n00bs

[Anonymous Coward]

I totally agree with you! Ubuntu/Kubuntu are very nice looking but they crash very ofter and sometimes console fixing does not work... Now I went back to Debian eventhought it is not a bleding edge distribution is a good stable one.

Re:debian is better for n00bs

[Anonymous Coward]

> can't be said of ubuntu's frantic release schedule, where every new silly snake release breaks more stuff)

Pick a Long-Term Support release. Ignore all the intervening releases.

> Nothing ever breaks in Debian.

It's the SAME SOFTWARE as Ubuntu.

> usually tying a ton of bloat together in "metapackages" i

Delete the metapackages first.

Re:debian is better for n00bs

[jedidiah]

Here you have the manifestation of the different release philosophies.

Debian is all about 'being stable". Ubuntu is all about "being current".

The more you change something (anything), the more likely you are to break something.

Of course if you are changing things all the time you are bound to break some people's stuff.

The obvious answer here it to take a book from the page of Debian and not update Ubuntu so damn much.

Re:debian is better for n00bs

[Anonymous Coward]

Debian IRC help not polite.
Ubuntu IRC help polite.

Debian users are territorial like packs of wolves.
Ubuntu users are generally much nicer.

Debian loves freedom at cost of everything else.
Ubuntu loves civility and courtesy above everything else.

Is it now clear why Ubuntu is popular and not superior compared to Debian?

Re:debian is better for n00bs

[Anonymous Coward]

Interesting, in RedHat 7,8 and 9, they where not using YUM but UP2DATE

When they stopped doing RedHat for desktops and created Fedora, they started using yum. Fedora Core 1 was released less than 8 years ago. Reading your post, having installed debian for 2 years, it would mean you used Redhat with YUM about 10 years ago, which is impossible as yum 1.0 was released around 2002/3

"Nothing ever breaks in Debian." False. Stuff breaks, thats life. Debian Stable is much better but Testing had major issues at some points.

Thanks for trolling.

Re:debian is better for n00bs

[Anonymous Coward]

usually tying a ton of bloat together in "metapackages" in such fashion that you can't remove some useless crap like, say , cowsay, or something, without removing your entire window manager

You just lost some credibility there. That IS NOT how meta-packages work. Try sticking to facts. uninstalling something that is in a meta-package does not uninstall the entire meta-package. It only uninstalls the meta-package which means that you now only have the independent things. Meta-packages are designed to make it easy to install lots of rellated, though not neciessarily dependent, software. Uninstalling the meta-pakage does not automatically uninstall all the deendencies.

Re:debian is better for n00bs

[marga]

As a Debian Developer, I'm very pleased to read comments like yours.

However, I think you are exaggerating. It's true that Debian is much more stable than Ubuntu, yes, and I'm very proud of that. Unfortunately it is not true that it _never_ breaks. Creating that sort of expectation is going to end up in a lot of frustration when something does break.

My worst cases of breakage are old notebooks, that used to work just fine with Lenny but now don't work just as well in Squeeze (hibernate doesn't work, fan control doesn't work, etc), due mainly to the kernel people not supporting those peripherals any more. There's only so much that we Debian folks can do, when upstream breaks, it's very very difficult to prevent the breakage in the distro.

Re:debian is better for n00bs

[wouterke]

Debian IRC help not polite.
Ubuntu IRC help polite.

Please report that. There's a bunch of operators on the #debian channel who regularly kick trolls and people who are not polite. The channel has had a pretty bad reputation in the past, but it's not really deserved anymore these days.

Debian users are territorial like packs of wolves.
Ubuntu users are generally much nicer.

Not in my experience.

Debian loves freedom at cost of everything else.
Ubuntu loves civility and courtesy above everything else.

Is it now clear why Ubuntu is popular and not superior compared to Debian?

Absolutely wrong. Simple example: Debian's been providing a non-free archive, even though there have been several votes to remove it (all of them failed).

Re:debian is better for n00bs

[Enigma23]

I have to agree that the main plus point to Debian is its stability. I'm not using it right now; I've got an Eee PC and am using an Ubuntu/Debian-based distro called Easy Peasy which is aimed very specifically at netbook users. The only times I've managed to crash my Eee was when I simply just pushed the hardware to do too much, too quickly, causing the whole system to grind to a standstill. Mea culpa.

Re:debian is better for n00bs

[Anonymous Coward]

Ugh....I detest that whole "netbuntu/easypeasy" interface.
I tried it on my netbook.
My netbook currently has peppermint os (light/fast, "cloud optimized" ubuntu/mint derived LXDE distro. I actually installed real apps (libreoffice, etc.) instead of just using the cloud app thingies).

Re:I run Ubuntu because it installs - Debian doesn

[Jello B.]

You are a conceited asshole.

I'm 16

Nobody gives a shit how smart you think you are just because you are SLIGHTLY relatively young and by luck you can get a Linux distro working on your particular setup with a default install.

Get bent.

Re:I run Ubuntu because it installs - Debian doesn

[Hatta]

Indeed. Ubuntu comes from an African word meaning "can't install Debian".

Re:I run Ubuntu because it installs - Debian doesn

[Anonymous Coward]

If you're going to start a response with "it's nothing personal" and "no offense is intended," it's probably not a good idea to end it with "go Darwin award yourself."

The next time you get a C or a D on one of your essays, double-check that the conclusion matches the thesis.

Re:You can't just count packages and draw conclusi

[ffreeloader]

You can't just count packages and draw conclusions from counts. Some of the packages haven't been updated in years. Some are only used by like five users on the planet. Some are so buggy they won't even run.

Weigh them by how many people install and use them, and you've got something to talk about, though.

Nope, you sure can't draw conclusions off of package counts alone.

However, a person, such as myself, can use Debian since 2003 and come to the conclusion that the packages, and packaging, in Debian are of high quality. A typical Debian Gnome desktop install takes around 3-4 gigs of hard drive space. My desktop installations, after a year or two, normally take up 12 to 15 gigs due to the number of packages I install. My longest running install--apt-get dist-upgrades from Woody through Etch--had more than 20 gigs of installed software. So, I can say I use a lot of the packages in the Debian repositories and I can't say I find buggy software inside Debian.

I can also come to the conclusion that you're just running at the mouth and have no idea as to what you're talking about. You're just plain old spreading FUD, nothing more or less than that. Seven, going on eight, years of Debian experince allows me to draw that conclusion about your post.

stop patching packages!

[Anonymous Coward]

i don't like Debian and others based on. Too much patching these days.

Debian 6?

[deniable]

I missed that completely. I wondered why squeeze was a bit quiet this week.

Re:I run Ubuntu because it installs - Debian doesn

[Vskye]

I really don't know why this is set as flamebait, some ppl actually do have real issues with a debian install.. given all the confusing d/l options available, along with lax luster support for wifi drivers and such.

This is how I see it.

[Beelzebud]

If Ubuntu disappeared tomorrow would the Debian team notice?

If Debian disappeared tomorrow would the Ubuntu team notice?

Now ask yourself. Who exactly isn't relevant?

Re:This is how I see it.

[WarmNoodles]

A just as relevant question is, If half the 890 *nix variants disappeared tomorrow, would anyone notice?

Re:This is how I see it.

[Beelzebud]

Considering that these days, around 870 of those are just Ubuntu remixes, I'd say no. :D

Re:This is how I see it.

[Anonymous Coward]

1. No.
2. No. See my sig.

Re:This is how I see it.

[Pflipp]

Oops, wasn't logged in.
See mig sig now:

Re:This is how I see it.

[Anonymous Coward]

I think the answer to both those questions is "no".

Ubuntu might have once been based on Debian, but these days is a completely independent distro. Sure, it resembles Debian because it started life as Debian with a few add-ons and a polish, but these days the only thing Debian about Ubuntu is the infrastructure -- the package format, filesystem layout, etc.

If Debian died tomorrow Ubuntu would continue, and not much harm would come to Linuxland. If Ubuntu were to die tomorrow, Linuxland would take a serious blow.

Re:This is how I see it.

[drinkypoo]

If Ubuntu disappeared tomorrow then Debian would notice as users demanded PPAs. On the plus side, Ubuntu users are used to being ignored; they even created a site to ignore our suggestions from.

Re:This is how I see it.

[u17]

If you RTFS, you will note that basically 92% of Ubuntu packages are imported from Debian. Who do you think maintains them?

Re:This is how I see it.

[Leolo]

If Ubuntu disappeared tomorrow would the Debian team notice?

Yes.

If Debian disappeared tomorrow would the Ubuntu team notice?

Yes.

Re:This is how I see it.

[Atriqus]

Depends, which half is Android in? :D

Re:This is how I see it.

[Anonymous Coward]

If Debian were to disappear, somebody else would pick up the development, and Canonical would piggy back on that somebody else.
If Ubuntu and Mint were to disappear, Debian would have nody to point at and say "look, we're important! We're their base! We did that!"

The importance of either is overstated IMHO. Debian suffers from being too stale for much but server use (but that's also partly why it's so stable), its bastard children suffer, however, from relying on Debian's thorough testing to point point of seemingly thinking that QA testing is below them, it's Debian, after all!

Debian is important to its derivatives, but is ultimately replaceable, as is any entity in open source, but not really anyone else. The bastard children are maybe important to Debian if only for the sake of name recognition, but are also replaceable. But it's not like either one is Red Hat or Novell.

Personally, I don't understand why people claim that Ubuntu is more "user-friendly".

Same here, I found Gentoo and Slack to break less often, personally, and both of those are precisely the opposite of user-friendly.

  At risk of coming off as a troll, I personally don't understand how *any* Linux distribution is claimed to be "user friendly". You can't ride the Unix-like and Unix train and claim user friendliness, it just doesn't work (career Unix guy here) Unix just isn't user friendly, the only user-friendly Unix systems out there (if that can even be pluralized) are such because rather than exposing the underlying Unixness, it is entirely hidden from the user (as in MacOS), the rest aren't based on Unix at all.

Unix is many, many things, many of them good things, but user-friendly is not, and has never been one of them.

Re:This is how I see it.

[Anonymous Coward]

If Ubuntu disappeared tomorrow would the users notice?

Your definition of "relevant" is exceedingly closed-minded.

Re:This is how I see it.

[Risen888]

You'd notice, because you couldn't get online.

Re:why debian is irrelevant:

[Anonymous Coward]

If that's true, why didn't debian stop after the first release? Why have they added 17 years of bugs to formerly rock solid software?

Re:why debian is irrelevant:

[ffreeloader]

Ummmm.... Goes to show you know very little about Debian. If you want up-to-date software run testing. It has fewer bugs than Ubuntu, and on average has newer software versions. Sure, Ubuntu may add some new packages before Debian does, but comparing package to package, Debian testing is more up-to-date....

I've been running testing or unstable on my workstation and laptop for years and I run into fewer problems in them than I do whenever I have tried Ubuntu. Ubuntu takes a snapshot of Debian unstable and then works on it for 6 months. For the 6 months Debian is moving to newer versions of the software Ubuntu took in the snapshot. Result? Unstable/Sid has newer software in the vast majority of cases.

Re:why debian is irrelevant:

[ffreeloader]

In almost 8 years of Debian usage I've run into that one time, but it was in testing, not stable, and it required the upgrading of glic so it was dependent on a major system change.

Re:You can't just count packages and draw conclusi

[gringer]

How the hell do the other 0.24% report them?

Probably privacy purists who don't want software sending things automatically over the internet, and send their results off manually.

Re:No Ubuntu on my Server

[Osgeld]

explain

Re:I run Ubuntu because it installs - Debian doesn

[ffreeloader]

Ummm... 2003 is calling and wants your FUD back.

Debian's installer is no more difficult than Ubuntu's. or Windows, although it does give you the option to go into more detail by using the "so-called" expert mode. Today's "expert" mode is pretty much dead simple unless you use something like linux RAID and then it requires you to know RAID. Other than that it doesn't require anywhere near the knowledge the Woody installer did.

It took me 3 tries to install Woody. If the Squeeze installer had been used for Woody installations I would have had a working installation the first time, knowing what I did then..

Re:I run Ubuntu because it installs - Debian doesn

[Anonymous Coward]

First, it's not a default install. I start with a "standard" install iso and install all the other packages like X11 and iceweasel after the system is installed. Keeps the system clean if I don't want gnome-screensaver or something like that. Also, I don't really care what you think, because I'm posting AC in what is nothing more than a troll thread. I'm pretty sure you have much better things to do with your time since you probably have a college degree and a day job. I have an excuse. I'm just some highschool kid who runs Debian and can't understand people having huge problems with what shouldn't be hard for someone trying to use Linux.

An although this is OT, note that I didn't use a single curse in my post, while you're using personal attacks out of rage. I think you need to sleep, so you aren't so cranky in the morning ;).

Re:You can't just count packages and draw conclusi

[icebraining]

Yeah, but they'd still need popcon to generate the list, which has a specific format.

Original: "Who the bloody hell cares about Debian"

[mmj638]

This summary is drawn from an opinion piece which was originally inspired by a presentation by Debian leader Stefano Zacchiroli in January called "Who the bloody hell cares about Debian".

Original presentation makes a solid case for why Debian is more important now than ever.

Stefano's blog post discussing the story behind the presentation is here. There is a link to the slides there and apparently video will be available soon.

Re:You can't just count packages and draw conclusi

[Anonymous Coward]

She memorized the popularity-contest protocol spec and reports her statistics with telnet -- and oven mitts.

(That's a Mrs. Roberts reference, in case anyone missed it.)

Re:You can't just count packages and draw conclusi

[shuz]

Hey! What do you mean 5? There are like 6 people that use JOE(Joe's Own Editor) and Nano is for L user's that don't know word star key binding's. /playgeekcard

RE :Why Debian matters more than ever

[gomadtroll]

A more significant historical link to the past, Corel Linux ,1999,was called Slink & a half. 9slink & Potato.'

Also Mint now has a release based on, 100% compatible with, Debian testing.

Just a bunch of noise though, love the new release, don't care what anyone else uses.

Re:why debian is irrelevant:

[froggymana]

Or even Unstable or Testing :)

Re:You can't just count packages and draw conclusi

[petermgreen]

I suspect that the most likely explanation is that those machines have suffered from dpkg database corruption.

Ubuntu

[Dennis Sheil]

Android aside, Ubuntu is far and away the most used Linux desktop. If you look at say, Wikipedia traffic analysis, Ubuntu has over twelve times the web users than the next closest competitor.

What does this mean? As GNOME was Ubuntu's desktop, it means a mass of new users for GNOME. I think this has been one of the main influences of Ubuntu. Linux has been on the server a long time, and people have been mucking with Apache on Linux and the like for a long time. But Ubuntu brought a lot of new users to the Linux desktop, and suddenly GNOME had a much wider user base than it did. This has exposed some bugs in GNOME and freedesktop.org applications, many of which have been patched. I have been mostly following the evince/poppler/cairo portion of this universe, and the influx of Ubuntu users has exposed bugs in all of these programs/libraries, many of which have been patched. Of course, Ubuntu has been moving somewhat away from Gnome to Unity, and it has already begun with Natty Narwhal.

The Kernel?

[Buttink]

Does this mean that the Kernel is irrelevant? Seriously, this is the stupidest argument ever. They also cannot live without each other. As far as what Ubuntu community produces, Ubuntu and Debian have much different users. I would nearly guarantee that every user of Debian knows one programming language. The same is not true for Ubuntu. Lets move on to the next retarded Linux /. post.

Debian? Jeez Louise!

[Anonymous Coward]

I dumped Debian Potato for FreeBSD the moment I got rid of the migraine that dpkg gave me, but I'd go back to it in a heartbeat rather than install Ubuntu or any of its "offspring".

Re:You can't just count packages and draw conclusi

[crusty_architect]

Make that 7. :)

Shouldn't have gotten the FreeBSD kernel involved

[Anonymous Coward]

http://www.debian.org/ports/kfreebsd-gnu/

Maybe it's just the BSD part of Debian that's dying. :)

My mum says...

[Beowulf878]

"this is obvious."

Since I put debian 6 on her laptop - the frequency of ubuntu updates annoyed her, and she refused to install them (windows failed her long ago - even without viruses the spyware slowed it to a crawl) - she thinks it matters a lot. And who am I to argue...?

I am slightly amused by all the insistence on its geek credentials. For the above installation I put the installation CD in and essentially pressed return until a working desktop came up. I admit I had to type 2 user names and passwords, but I didn't find it too onerous. For my other machines I might do other things - but that is me complicating matters and nothing inherently to do with debian. It seems all my hardware is so old now, it just works out of the box.

{Kindly refrain from posting "j00r m0m" jokes... heard them all before... really. Not a challenge, either.}

Re:My mum says...

[dlgeek]

Reminds me of a great quote by Joey Hess who did a lot of work on the Debian Installer. Something along the lines of "It takes more keystrokes to enter a Windows Product Key than it does to complete an entire Debian Install".

Re:My mum says...

[Stellian]

The Windows product might worth the money and the effort. Free is not allays better for the end-user, allot of grief for the non-techie Linux user comes from the uncompromising philosophical posturing of not allowing for-profit software in the default install. Once you have a solid open foundation, software be it closed or open source should be allowed to compete on an equal basis, this is the best way to meet the needs of the user. Think Android.

Re:My mum says...

[Anonymous Coward]

Your mom is so nerdy, but so nerdy, that she has 2 USB slots in her body: one at VAG1NA and one at the A55

Re:My mum says...

[Anonymous Coward]

I wouldn't talk about your mother, because if she found out, she might quit sucking my cock everyday.

matters more than ever?

[Anonymous Coward]

Yeah... we love Linux and we matter, dammit!

All 1% of us.

Re:Debian: more relevant than Steven Vaughan-Nicho

[Amiralul]

So Debian is for Ubuntu what BSD is for OSX?

Common package maintainers

[absurdhero]

The Debian project lead, Stefano Zacchiroli, is being terribly misquoted.

The numbers in the article do not address the common case of having one package maintainer for both distros. That 74% actually means that 74% of packages are *in common* between the distros. It is conceivable that much of that 74% is because of maintainers who contribute to both distributions. It isn't fair to say that Debian does all the work and Ubuntu merely takes advantage of it.

Seeing that the same package exists in both Debian and Ubuntu does not mean that the package originated in Debian and was taken without effort by an Ubuntu maintainer. Frequently, the same person creates a package for both. Either by creating an Ubuntu package and verifying that it works on Debian or the other way around.

Go look at the names of package maintainers. You'll see the same big group of people working on both projects.

As Ozzie would say

[celtic_hackr]

Who the Fuck is Steven Vaughan-Nichols?

I have run Debian based systems for a very long time. Mepis, Mint, Kubuntu, and on and on. On my server, it's just pure straight stable Debian. I did, at one point have to compromise slightly on that for PHP5, IIRC. It can be frustrating running pure stable Debian. Unstable Debian can be just as frustrating. Hence the need for third party Debian based distros. If it wasn't for Debian's crazy release schedule and placement of code in unstable or testing when it really needs to be in stable, there would be little need for the alternatives. Heck if Debian came out with a "Best of Debian" branch they'd probably kill most of the need for the Debian based distros.

I've used them all, and just like debian based more. Started with Slackware, went to RH and then Mandrake, then Debian - after that it becomes a blur. Even tried Corel Linux, LFS, Gentoo, DSL. Lastly, I tried building my own. But then I discovered Mepis, and Mint and Ubuntu variants. When Mepis went quiet, I switched to Mint. Tried Ubuntu, but hated it - for some reason.

Now of course this was a comment made by perhaps the most successful troll in the IT world, Mr. Nichols. So what can we really expect. This is what you get when you feed trolls too much. But using the closest thing we have to track Linux distribution, Distrowatch, Mr Nichols means if you're' not in the top three you're just not as important anymore. Then of course, you have the fact that Debian based distros control over 40% of the webserver market, [+ RH based ~92%]. I guess that's not important either.

Re:As Ozzie would say

[afabbro]

Who the Fuck is Steven Vaughan-Nichols?

I have run Debian based systems for a very long time. Mepis, Mint, Kubuntu, and on and on. On my server, it's just pure straight stable Debian.

And just who are you? Why should we care what you run? Or about the fascinating history of your personal odyssey through Linux distributions?

Re:As Ozzie would say

[petermgreen]

If it wasn't for Debian's crazy release schedule

Imo 2 years is about right for server distros of linux, slow enough to keep the pain of upgrading down.

And if you really need newer versions of specific software there is always backports (which is now an official service).

Then of course, you have the fact that Debian based distros control over 40% of the webserver market [w3techs.com], [+ RH based ~92%]. I guess that's not important either.

That is 40% of LINUX webservers not 40% of all webservers.

Mint

[G3ckoG33k]

"Ubuntu is debian packaged for (possibly non-tech-savvy) end-users and polished a bit."

Hmmmm. But then Mint would win out. Mint started out as Ubuntu packaged for (possibly non-tech-savvy) end-users and polished a bit. Then they skipped the intermediate step, Ubuntu, and went for the source itself - Debian.

Show me the pundits

[Anonymous Coward]

Show me the pundits ranting that Debian is irrelevant! For Ubuntu, its CRITICAL! My only beef with Debian (ok, there were a few) is the very long time between releases (although given the size of the packages included, it can be understood), and the ginormous, unabated, unending bickering, squabbling, infighting, and back-alley biker-gang knife-fight going on in perpetuity on the mailing lists. (I remember a long while ago, Ken Thompson did an interview, and was asked about the developer e-mail he had with Unix, and how it compared to the Linux kernel mailing list, and he said that with Unix, people got angry, really really angry, and since some of them (literally) had fingers able to press buttons connected to ICBM's (they really were steely-eyed-missile-men), running Unix, you didn't really want to mess with them. He then related the occasional ruckus on LKML as 'like rustling a nest of butterflies', but apparently he has never seen the Debian mailing lists. That aside, Debian matters, more than ever. I wish there were more transparency (and error reporting feedback) between Ubuntu and Debian. Its been a source of contention before. I'm not one to talk a lot though. I've only contributed to a few projects, primarily the Linux kernel (and was only really instrumental in pulling out bugs 6 or 7 times).

I'm wondering about the last percent of Ubuntu..

[Anonymous Coward]

Maybe it consists of... Dark roasted beans?

Re:You can't just count packages and draw conclusi

[Anonymous Coward]

You can't just count packages and draw conclusions from counts. Some of the packages haven't been updated in years. Some are only used by like five users on the planet. Some are so buggy they won't even run.

Weigh them by how many people install and use them, and you've got something to talk about, though.

*shrugs* works for apple.

how are you going to argue with over A BILLION THINGS DOWNLOADED? hmm?

Re:eMac

[dkalley]

I have been running Debian with XFCE on my eMac for a few years now and would recommend it. Alsa is buggy, you need to run alsa-conf each time after a reboot, limited Flash (PPC in general), limited Win codecs (PPC in general), depending on your hardware version the display settings can be funky and may need to be changed before you run X for the first time. It would be a better choice on the hardware, I tried Fedora for a moment and promptly went back to Debian.

Village Spared From Deadly Storm

[epine]

News to me. Who's calling it irrelevant?

Didn't you get the memo from the department of small minds? Importance is now measured with a blood pressure cuff.

When a brick decides to be a simple brick "Imminent Storm Threatens Village".

In Zittrain's world (The Future of the Internet and How to Mess it Up Real Bad) what matters most of all in technology is generativity: the usefulness of a brick to support other bricks. Possibly I mean Lego bricks, but more likely I mean Mechano, since generativity gloms in all directions.

I've also read that C and/or C++ are less important than they once were, all the importance has shifted to other languages, themselves written in C/C++. Moreover, Internet Protocol is also overrated, and all the addresses are gone anyway. What matters now are Facebook pages.

Will this stupidity never end? Why do some people feel the need to stand up and scream from the rooftops "I don't get generativity"?

Debian sucked when it was the dominant distribution. Debian's proper place in the universe is as the primary building block for other distributions with looser morals. Debasement and gloss are the last layers in mass appeal. They almost always travel together.

Re:I run Ubuntu because it installs - Debian doesn

[mikael_j]

Indeed. I ended up with Ubuntu on my netbook for a long while simply because when installing Debian the installer would mix up disklabels in various seemingly random ways while the Ubuntu installer actually managed to install grub on the SSD instead of the USB stick I was installing from (the Debian installer when told to install on "/dev/sdb" rather than "/dev/sda" of course borked the whole thing by configuring grub to attempt to load stuff from "/dev/sdb" which didn't exist when the USB stick wasn't attached).

Of course, I eventually solved that problem by setting up a PXE boot server and installing Debian that way, but just the fact that I had a choice between "mess around with the bootloader configuration", "boot over the network" or "just use Ubuntu" kind of highlights the issues with the install process for Debian. It's not a matter of shiny, it's a matter of making sure it doesn't outright break unless you go in and manually edit config files at the right point in the installation procedure.

Re:You can't just count packages and draw conclusi

[shawb]

You beat me to it although a different punch line.

Re:eMac

[joeyadams]

Fedora 12 also starts out with no sound on the eMac. Next time you reboot, you may want to try modprobe snd-powermac and see if that turns on sound. If so, try adding snd-powermac to /etc/modules, /etc/modules.conf, or /etc/sysconfig/modules .

Re:You can't just count packages and draw conclusi

[arunce]

Sure, I'm one of that five.

Re:The Family Guy

[Chrisq]

Last time I checked your mother was all woman.

His mother had a sex change op since then.

We call it the "Tamagotchi"

[Krischi]

Like a Tamagotchi, Gentoo will roll over and die if you do not tend to its needs on a daily basis.

Don't get me wrong, I loved this distribution while I used it, but at some point maintenance became too time-consuming, let alone the risk of stuff breaking right before an important deadline.

Numbers

[Spad]

What about the other 1%?

Re:You can't just count packages and draw conclusi

[gringer]

they'd still need popcon to generate the list

They'd only need an understanding of the popcon list format, which could be obtained from looking at the source without installing. This is Debian — every package has source which can be perused by those with a wary eye.

Re:You can't just count packages and draw conclusi

[uglyduckling]

TCP/IP over carrier pigeon, using hand-crafted packets assembled to the correct protocol for popularity-contest to understand. Obviously.

Re:You can't just count packages and draw conclusi

[thue]

> Some are so buggy they won't even run.

I have never had this problem with a Debian package. My strong impression is that buggy packages are removed before a Major Debian release is made.

Re:You can't just count packages and draw conclusi

[Anonymous Coward]

> when you do a new debian install.

A new Debian INSTALLATION.

You INSTALL a new INSTALLATION.

Please study the difference between NOUNS and VERBS.

Debian 3rd most widely-used distro

[6031769]

According to the Linux Counter Debian is third on the list being installed on 15.97% of registered machines (after Ubuntu and Others). Yes, it is a self-selecting sample, but the numbers are large enough to carry some weight, IMHO.

Another car analogy. And wrong.

[RichiH]

If you stopped producing carriages, cars would still be made.

Ubuntu, Mint, etc depend on Debian. Without it, they would need to base on something else or invest incredible amounts of time into providing it themselves.

Re:I run Ubuntu because it installs - Debian doesn

[RichiH]

To maintain your style, oh trusty AC:

>16 years old in 2011
>installed Windows 98

obvioustrollisobvious.jpg

Re:Ubantu = Fail

[MrHanky]

As of December, Ubuntu was behind nearly the same amount of Wikipedia traffic as Android, slightly more than the more directly comparable iPad (assuming phones aren't used as much for web surfing as computers are, whereas the iPad is specifically designed for it). Either the iPad is still irrelevant, or Ubuntu is relevant.

http://stats.wikimedia.org/archive/squid_reports/2010-12/SquidReportOperatingSystems.htm

Re:You can't just count packages and draw conclusi

[AllyGreen]

Add another for JOE!

Re:You can't just count packages and draw conclusi

[Tolleman]

Hell I have two users on different systems that ask me to install it. That wouldn't happen to be you two would it?

Ice cream is really just milk and sugar and flavor

[Anonymous Coward]

"According to a presentation given recently by Debian Project Leader (DPL) Stefano Zacchiroli, only 7% of Ubuntu is directly derived from upstream projects, Canonical's projects, or other non-Debian sources. Of the rest, 74% of Ubuntu is rebuilt Debian packages, and 18% are patched and rebuilt Debian packages."

So in other words, Ubuntu is what Debian really ought to be?

Re:I'm wondering about the last percent of Ubuntu.

[Anonymous Coward]

:)

Ubuntu Server vs. Debian

[Compaqt]

Yeah, Centos is useless for websites/webapps.

Does anyone have an informed opinion/anecdotes on Ubuntu Server (not desktop) vs. Debian (of whatever flavor) for websites/webapps ?

LTS vs. the latest?

Re:Ubuntu Server vs. Debian

[petermgreen]

I don't use ubuntu myself but the main downside seems to be that it's shorter release cycles and the fact they prioritise releasing on time over getting rid of bugs leads to a lower quality product. Even the LTS releases come out of the 6 month release cycle they are just supported for longer.

The main upside of ubuntu lts seems to be the longer support lifecycle. With debian if you want to keep getting security updates you have to do a potentially disruptive upgrade approximately once every 2 years and you have a window of about 1 year to do it in. With ubuntu LTS you have a three year window and can even skip a release if you want.

I wouldn't generally run a non-lts release of ubuntu on a server unless you have a good reason to (e.g. your hardware is new enough that neither current debian stable or current ubuntu LTS gets on with it) it just means you have to do potentially disruptive upgrades even more often.

Re:Ubuntu Server vs. Debian

[Mr. DOS]

I prefer Debian (stable) on my servers. While Ubuntu may have more up-to-date packages, I generally find the almost guaranteed stability of Debian to be more worth it. With Debian, I can install my server, configure automatic updates, and expect it not to break anything by itself while I get on with life and developing whatever the server's supposed to be running. I don't feel that safe with any other distro.

Re:Ubuntu Server vs. Debian

[daffmeister]

You would certainly want to stick to LTS rather than the six-montly releases for an Ubuntu Server. It's not just the less frequent updating, they deliberately try more experimental things in the six-monthlies but focus on stability for the LTS releases.

Regarding Ubuntu vs Debian: I run 15-20 Ubuntu servers currently, in a mix of 8.04 and 10.04. After a failed attempt on my home server to go from 8.04 to 10.04 in place I've only upgraded on my production machines via a fresh install, part of the reason some are still on 8.04.

I don't know if Debian is more solid for in-place upgrades (I once borked a Debian server doing an in-place upgrade but that was about six years ago).

Underwhelmed?

[xnpu]

I'm not underwhelmed at all. Debian 6 delivers exactly what I expect from it.

I've been using Debian for over 10 years, with some short trips into the worlds of Redhat, SuSE as well as Debian derivatives like Ubuntu. Debian is still the only one that I trust to smoothly upgrade from Debian 5 to Debian 6 within minutes without getting stuck somewhere and requiring me to fix things manually. Having upgraded 17 servers in the last few days, including web servers, mail servers, radius servers, etc. I've not been disappointed once.

All my servers are current and it didn't cause me a headache. How's this underwhelming?

Re:Peek

[TaoPhoenix]

RIP Kim Peek.

https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/wiki/Kim_Peek

Re:You can't just count packages and draw conclusi

[marcosdumay]

Why do you think so? Most people use free software to get things done, not because they are tin-foil nuts.

Also, did you realise that there is a false dicotomy at the above paragraph. "Free software nuts" is different from "tin-foil nuts", and whther any of them aren really nuts is out to the reader to decide.

Re:Externalization

[TaoPhoenix]

Ubuntu needs to resist the urge to play Extend and Extinguish (by accident). There was scuttle that Ubuntu wasn't properly sending their stuff back down to the Debian core to be merged.

Re: someone's comment on the Best of Debian, it would be interesting if Ubuntu and Mint and ____ and ____ all unified, and made 1 click options on the Debian Install "If you click this it will be easier but less pure."

I like the concept described above of Debian being almost an academic, theoretical distro, then externalize all the tweaks for newer users. I get the whole purity argument, and I only plead lack of ability to do it right, so I need the "crutches".

Differences in philosophy

[olau]

Well, the target groups are different. Debian never was really good at addressing the needs of Linux illiterates. Ubuntu wasn't exactly the first fork. I think part of the problem is that you have to cut some things in order to make it simpler (or otherwise spend an eternity trying to keep flexibility), and in Debian, well, people don't want to upset users who can claim legitimate needs.

Ubuntu on the other hand has always been about saying no and focusing on a target group. It's easier for them to make Things Just Work (minus bugs of course) without configuration or stupid questions. The dark side of it is that if you have a problem and it's not a typical target group problem, then you're in trouble.

That's why I'm running Ubuntu on my desktop at work, but Debian (testing) on the server. I didn't want to spend forever setting up the desktop, and I don't want to have a packaging problem with some software on the server and have it closed or ignored because the Ubuntu package maintainer is hired by Canonical to maintain a gazillion packages and this one is not one of those the central administration has declared important. Better battle with a Debian geek who might need a beating with a clue bat but who at least cares.

Of course, over time, some of the differences vanish as both distributions improve. For instance, it's much easier to install Debian these days, and conversely there a lot more packages and package maintainers for Ubuntu than there used to be.

However, the target group Ubuntu is addressing is by far the biggest and the one with the most press. Still, Debian is a testament to the power of self-organization, just like Wikipedia and OpenStreetMap. Life without Debian would be sad.

Re:You can't just count packages and draw conclusi

[marcosdumay]

I often find buggy packages in Debian stable. And those are normaly software that is buggy upstream, and kind of unique, not having any replacement available on other distros (without compiling the same bugged one) nor on Windows. The situation is so that I normaly report the bug upstream, instead of on Debian. I guess it is better to have buggy software that do some of the things that it should do than no software at all.

The amount of functionality available inside the Debian repositories would make (and normaly does make) .rmp users dizzy, and Windows users completely lost.

Re:You can't just count packages and draw conclusi

[marcosdumay]

Nano is the default editor for fresh Debian instalations, so I guess there are more than 6 people using it.

Re:Ice cream is really just milk and sugar and fla

[santax]

Yes, but a whole lot slower and irritating with all those *you want to do something? Give me your password*-crap.

Re:I'm wondering about the last percent of Ubuntu.

[WarmNoodles]

Hey, don't vote for the bean just cause its Dark roasted.

Ubuntu, change you can bean in.

I love Debian Too

[jedidiah]

...and I am an Ubuntu user.

Something that becomes a strong influence for others does not lose any significance for having inspired something bigger or greater. It only becomes more significant.

Debian is MORE relevant now rather than less.

Really misguided

[Chealer]

If you're using Ubuntu (or Linux Mint, or Mepis...), you're really using Debian with some enhancements.

Oh, please. I hurt when I hear people saying Mepis, Knoppix, Xandros or whatever is Debian [except foo]. A non-insignicant portion of questions on Debian forums is about derivatives, please don't encourage. If your Debian-based distribution has some issue, Debian people most likely can't even help you. If the distribution you use is not Debian, then you're really *not* using Debian. Most people forking take Debian, remove half of it, add themes, a few "user-friendly" interfaces, a couple of bugs along the way, then proceed to shipping something twice more outdated that they won't maintain. If your problem is with an outdated piece of software, Debian people cannot help you. There are, however, some "distributions" that *are* Debian. These are called Debian Pure Blends, see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Debian_Pure_Blend

Re:As seen by the Zen Masster

[Anonymous Coward]

The individual body parts argued on who was the most important amongst them.
The brain dismissed them all saying he was the mastermind, the stomach that he provided the energy to fuel the mastermind, the ears....and so on
This went on without end until they decided to ask the Zen Master...who replied ..."him by whose absence things would seem worst"

Re:You can't just count packages and draw conclusi

[Anonymous Coward]

Maybe there's a geek or two out there that decided to compile from source.

Debian

[chadryan]

Without Debian, Ubuntu would not exist.

Re:You can't just count packages and draw conclusi

[icebraining]

He's not much of a geek if he doesn't know how to use apt-get source to get a source package that compiles to a deb.

Re:Debia what?

[johnw]

sorry I use ubuntu and really dont give a shit about it's grandparents

Or about punctuation.

Debian dropped the ball.

[Anonymous Coward]

Debian dropped the ball years ago by not including closed source drivers by default, and Ubuntu picked up the ball and ran with it. At least Ubuntu has helped to improve Debian overall :)

Daddy Debian

[Anonymous Coward]

"industry pundits" any time I see this phrase i close my ears and run. pundit = paid shill We were once a Solaris shop and after being bought and sold we had to start looking for a replacement OS. About 10 years of training and working with Solaris when right down the tubes. Me and the company I work for simply REFUSE to have anything to do with Oracle. We felt this way before Oracle bought Sun. The first requirement we came up with was at least the distro base had to be community owned. I had used Debian in the past and yes maybe a bit out dated but STABLE and isn't this what you want in a server? So we agreed on Debian to be our base. Best decision we ever made. Of one thing we also did run some Linux servers running apps that wouldn't run on Solaris and all our routers are running Vyatta when working and jumping from machine to machine it used to get aggravating to change basic commands when changing fro UNIX to Linux. Cls look the same but aren't. Since changing to an all Debian base life has gotten simpler. Commands are the same on the routers or the servers. Updates and installing packages are all the same.

We run Debian on the servers that run basic backend things (DNS, MTA, etc) because of the long release. Things like BIND and Postfix running as the MTA need to be stable and we don't upgrade these servers until they get old. We don't want to upgrade the base OS every 6 months to get security updates. So Debian is the best choice.

We do have customers that need the latest packages for their apps so for them we run Ubuntu LTR Server. Still the same under the hood and still the same at the CL and still on our routers we are running Vyatta which is Debian based. So now we have a common environment on everything. Nice! Rad Hat and all the others are great but there are differences in the commands. You have to stop and think "What flavor am I on?" With everything having the same base you don't have this trouble. I have yet to find an app that wouldn't run on some "type" of Debian. Oh yes writing FAQ's for the staff is easier. Just one step instead of "On Solaris do this and Red Hat do this and on Gentoo do it this way" Now it is "do this on all systems".

I did love Solaris but I must admit installing and app could sometimes be a real bitch. Granted once install it just sat there and ran but the set up could be a nightmare. We haven't had anything like that with any Debian based product. Most of the time installing sometime is just "apt-get -y install package" IT was never that easy on Solaris.

So you want to run a server in our data center and us maintain it the first question we ask is "Who's your Daddy?"

We will not get caught being bought and sold by Corporate asshats again. I'm not a industry pundit but an industry senior engineer with 30 years of experience and I say relevant? HELL YES! Thank you Debian and all your team!

BTW Need good routers that can handle up to 10GB of throughput? Throw out that Cisco shit and buy a box throw two or more NICs in it and load Vyatta. If your team is trained on Debian the learning curve isn't bad after all it is Debian based. You'll never go back to Cisco. Oh yes need a package that isn't in the Vyatta repo just add the Debian repos and apt-get install. That easy!

and your point

[Anonymous Coward]

would be?

Re:I run Ubuntu because it installs - Debian doesn

[wouterke]

That particular bug, as it happens, has been fixed for squeeze. Debian now uses UUIDs rather than /dev/sd* entries to boot, by default, which does not have that problem.

Debian 6 is a great release

[JimLynch]

It definitely still matters and Debian 6 Squeeze is the best version yet. My full review for desktop users here: http://desktoplinuxreviews.com/2011/02/12/debian-6-squeeze/

Re:why debian is irrelevant:

[Anonymous Coward]

i have testing in my sources with no major problems

by the way froggy, mirix already had unstable covered (sid) ...just to be pedantic

if you really want bleeding edge, try the experimental repositories... but have the bug spray handy :)

you can also download experimental debs directly and use dpkg (might be safer than adding experimental to your apt sources)

More info and packages for experimental Debian:
http://wiki.debian.org/DebianExperimental
http://packages.debian.org/experimental/

Re:Debian: more relevant than Steven Vaughan-Nicho

[Anonymous Coward]

Considering that the BSD components in the XNU kernel are primarily User-Domain stuff, No.